Pragmatically, Environmentalism Means Dealing with China's Emissions
I wrote recently that it’s possible Lisa Jackson is stepping down from her position as administrator of the EPA because of the imminent approval of the Keystone XL pipeline. In response, frequent commenter Larry Lemmert notes:
(What will happen) if the Keystone pipeline (is) not permitted? China would pay for a transCanadian pipeline which crosses the Rockies and terminates in Vancouver. I think that the potential for ecological damage is at least as great and probably greater with this mountainous terrain. Now it gets really dicey when you consider what happens when the oil gets to China. Have you ever breathed the air in Beijing? Their environmental laws are almost nonexistent. If you are concerned about carbon dioxide emitted from burning this oil, consider that the same amount of CO2 circulates around the globe whether it is released in the USA or in China.
Without a doubt, we either help China fix its environmental issues or deal with the fact that what we’re doing here has very limited value.
Btw, this is exactly what I told a consultant sent here a couple of months ago by the German government who wanted my advice on what his country should do vis-à-vis clean energy. At the end of the 30-minute interview, I said, “I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but I notice that every one of your questions concerns Germany, and it’s great that your country wants to be a leader in this critically important industry. But realize that, even if Germany reduces its carbon footprint to zero, you and I still live on the same planet as China. Our environment is only as healthy as its largest polluters. We either help them change what they’re doing, or the Earth is toast.”
It is fair enough to criticize Canada for developing its oil sands and China for using coal to generate the power that it needs, but you continue to ignore the methane that escapes from the shale gas fracking process that will soon put the US back at the top of of the GHG emitters list.
Unless there are policy changes, it is more likely that China will help us solve our energy problems here in the U.S. than the other way around.
China is committed to expanding nuclear power and, along with some other countries but excluding the U.S., is doing R & D work on the liquid fluoride thorium reactor (LFTR), which looks very promising, and other reactor technologies. We, on the other hand, are practically ignoring nuclear power. However, that may be temporary, just as Japan temporarily decided to phase out nuclear power until they realized that doing so would be impractical; now they plan to build more nuclear power plants. I expect Germany to do the same, i.e., expand its use of nuclear power, but perhaps not for five years or so depending on how long it takes them to face reality.
It’s true, as the article implies, that even we here in the U.S. totally eliminated CO2 emissions, there would still be a serious problem with global warming if other countries continued to increase their CO2 emissions. However, it looks as though the only way we could help them reduce CO2 emissions adequately would be to help them expand nuclear power, but I would oppose doing so with pressurized water reactors or reactors which use uranium.