The Great Wall of Carbon

Paul Krugman, Straits Times 16 May 09;

I HAVE seen the future, and it won't work.

These should be hopeful times for environmentalists. Junk science no longer rules in Washington. President Barack Obama has spoken forcefully about the need to take action on climate change. The people I talk to are increasingly optimistic that the United States Congress will soon establish a cap-and-trade system that limits emissions of greenhouse gases, with the limits growing steadily tighter over time. And once America acts, we can expect much of the world to follow its lead.

But that still leaves the problem of China, where I have been for most of the last week.

Like every visitor to China, I was awed by the scale of the country's development. Even the annoying aspects - much of my time was spent viewing the Great Wall of Traffic - are by-products of the nation's economic success.

But China cannot continue along its current path because the planet can't handle the strain.

The scientific consensus on prospects for global warming has become much more pessimistic over the last few years. Indeed, the latest projections from reputable climate scientists border on the apocalyptic. Why? Because the rate at which greenhouse gas emissions are rising is matching or exceeding the worst-case scenarios.

And the growth of emissions from China - already the world's largest producer of carbon dioxide - is one main reason for this new pessimism.

China's emissions, which come largely from its coal-burning electricity plants, doubled between 1996 and 2006. That was a much faster pace of growth than in the previous decade. And the trend seems set to continue: In January, China announced that it plans to continue its reliance on coal as its main energy source and that to feed its economic growth it will increase coal production 30 per cent by 2015. That's a decision that, all by itself, will swamp any emission reductions elsewhere.

So what is to be done about the China problem?

Nothing, say the Chinese. Each time I raised the issue during my visit, I was met with outraged declarations that it was unfair to expect China to limit its use of fossil fuels. After all, they declared, the West faced no similar constraints during its development; while China may be the world's largest source of carbon dioxide emissions, its per capita emissions are still far below American levels; and anyway, the great bulk of the global warming that has already happened is due not to China but to the past carbon emissions of today's wealthy nations.

And they're right. It is unfair to expect China to live within constraints that we didn't have to face when our own economy was on its way up. But that unfairness doesn't change the fact that letting China match the West's past profligacy would doom the Earth as we know it.

Historical injustice aside, the Chinese also insisted that they should not be held responsible for the greenhouse gases they emit when producing goods for foreign consumers. But they refused to accept the logical implication of this view - that the burden should fall on those foreign consumers instead, that shoppers who buy Chinese products should pay a 'carbon tariff' that reflects the emissions associated with those goods' production. That, said the Chinese, would violate the principles of free trade.

Sorry, but the climate change consequences of Chinese production have to be taken into account somewhere. And anyway, the problem with China is not so much what it produces as how it produces it. Remember, China now emits more carbon dioxide than the US, even though its gross domestic product is only about half as large (and the US, in turn, is an emissions hog compared with Europe or Japan).

The good news is that the very inefficiency of China's energy use offers huge scope for improvement. Given the right policies, China could continue to grow rapidly without increasing its carbon emissions. But first it has to realise that policy changes are necessary.

There are hints, in statements emanating from China, that the country's policymakers are starting to realise that their current position is unsustainable. But I suspect that they don't realise how quickly the whole game is about to change.

As the US and other advanced countries finally move to confront climate change, they will also be morally empowered to confront those nations that refuse to act. Sooner than most people think, countries that refuse to limit their greenhouse gas emissions will face sanctions, probably in the form of taxes on their exports. They will complain bitterly that this is protectionism, but so what? Globalisation doesn't do much good if the globe itself becomes unliveable.

It's time to save the planet. And like it or not, China will have to do its part.

NEW YORK TIMES