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doug_durham 3 hours ago

A troll response I presume. Or perhaps sarcasm without the indicator.

declan_roberts 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Not a troll comment. China produces as much or more CO2 as much as the next 5 countries combined.

It's logical to start with the king of greenhouse emissions if you want to stop global warming.

renjimen 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Not per capita. The US is still the worst large country. If you account for offshoring manufacturing then the US looks even worse.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-greenhouse-gas-emissions

rayiner 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The climate doesn’t care about per capita obviously.

renjimen 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Climate doesn't care about political borders either.

But per capita is more informative when thinking about policy for curbing emissions, which is how we actually change our effect on the climate.

Hikikomori an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

The rest of the world produces more than china. Checkmate.

reducesuffering 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Why should should per-capita be most important? If country A keeps their population stable and emissions under control, but country B of the same starting population, keeps doubling their population and doubling their emissions, why should country A have an increasingly declined allowance of emissions when they were more responsible in keeping their total emissions down (by not having as many people)?

Scarblac 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Because per capita is the only thing that makes sense.

If China were to split into 10 countries each emitting 10% of what they do now it'd be the exact same emissions, but according to you it would be much better.

Similarly if the EU would become one country, that country would be high up on the list, much higher than member countries now! Oh no!

Looking at per capita emissions is much more fair.

Anyway, China's emissions are falling since last year ( https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-co2-emissions-ha... ). What's the US doing?

chucksta 2 hours ago | parent [-]

It can't realistically be solved at a per capita level though

renjimen 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Individuals can of course make choices to reduce their emissions, Americans more than most since they're starting higher. Buy less new stuff, eat less meat, fly less, etc.

But policy is where real change needs to be made, and the effects of policy still scale with population in most cases.

Scarblac 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Maybe we should start trying before we conclude that.

shoxidizer 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If country B splits into countries C, D, E and F, all of which emit less than country A, has it found an effective way to reduce emissions? Should all countries adopt the Monaco lifestyle to defeat global warming? I guess if you want to find a fair way to measure administration of land you could emmisions per hectare or rainfall.

layer8 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

China has a declining population, and had a one-child policy for many years.

Also, you don’t want all the low-population countries to each start contributing as much to global warming as the US.

hiccuphippo 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Because some countries pay others to pollute in their stead?

markdown 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Because country A just outsourced their emission production to country B.

generj 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

China is rapidly going green.

reducesuffering 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Is the US even more rapidly going green? https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co2?hideControls=false&...

China's emissions were 10 billion tons CO2 in 2017 and have increased every single year to 12.29 billion tons CO2 in 2024. Meanwhile, US decreased from 5.22 to 4.9 in the same time

shoxidizer 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Both these trends have reversed in 2025.

US emissions icreased by 2.5% https://rhg.com/research/us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-2025/

China's emmisions have decreased by <1% https://e360.yale.edu/digest/china-emissions-decline

michaelmrose 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

1/4 the population. Per capita we are 65% worse not considering how much of China's pollution is on our behalf

Windchaser 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Yeah, and don't even get me started on historic emissions.

China has only produced significant CO2/capita in the last decade. The US and Europe are responsible for the accumulated GHG that have gotten us into the current mess. We blew nearly the entire CO2 "budget" for keeping us under 2C of warming, just by ourselves, so it's kinda odd to be pointing fingers at the foreigners who are just now halfway catching up to what we're emitting now.

laffOr 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

There is no need for ordering right? All countries can start acting at the same time.

smt88 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You can't really isolate China's emissions. They manufacture a huge proportion of the goods the rest of the world needs to operate. The green countries are essentially outsourcing their pollution to China.