China continues to increase coal usage

hmm. How should I put this?

 

Burning coal along with any other fossil fuel creates to a variable degree:

• local pollution - both air and ash. Their toxic effects visibly impact local populations. This includes transportation fuels.
• man-made global warming - it is there but impossible to identify the source of any given CO{2} molecule OR where are the missing carbon capture flora? About 3/4ths of our planet have photo plankton doing what they can.

Local pollution tends to cause local reactions. For example, the 1970s SMOG led to the EPA under Richard Nixon. Yet I remember learning about Venus global warming after probes explored that planet.

As for greenhouse gasses, a better solution is cheaper sources of power like solar, wind, nuclear, or hydro. Make burning fossil fuels expensive and economics will solve the problem. But laying blame seldom works except to start unproductive quarrels.

Bob Wilson

 

Oh, you mean like a carbon tax and tariff? Making it expensive to use fossil fuels to address climate change should affect fossil fuel use across the board should it not?

>B-b-but tariffs make things expensive.

Well, how else will fossil fuel use across the border be disincentivized? I don't trust other nations to actually uphold their Paris accord commitments. And why should other countries do the same?

Cut the self-righteous crap. People criticizing China's approach with greenhouse gas emissions is warranted, considering the impact it has. This is not blaming; it's literally the prisoner's dilemma playing out. If climate change is a global issue and certain top emitting nations, like China, show no real signs that emissions are slowing down, then why would that not cause someone concern?

 

Silly wabbit. Take your own medicine or just admit you're trolling to start a quarrel.

As I've posted before, we simply need wind, solar, hydro, and nuclear to be cheaper than burning fossil fuels. To quote a famous inventor:

In 1879, the New York Herald quoted Edison as saying: "We will make electric light so cheap that only the rich will be able to burn candles."​

Bob Wilson

 

You start more sh*t than anyone in this forum then have the audacity to say that starting quarrels is unproductive. I don't have to look far back to see threads you have started that can easily be interpreted as attempting to start a quarrel based on how you characterize my interactions. Always accuse others of what you are doing yourself. Geez.

>When I address people's comments, all I am doing is dispelling what I believe to be misinformation or an outright lie. However anyone doing the same as me is just trolling.
Can you not see the arrogance in this mindset? It's literally how you think.

Already happens in the US. In China, that's another matter entirely. They are using more coal, not same amount or less. No major downward trend.

 

Well we've hit an impasse:

• Blame China First (always?) ignoring what can be done by whining the "blame game."
• In 1879, the New York Herald quoted Edison as saying: "We will make electric light so cheap that only the rich will be able to burn candles."

If you ever decide to stop feeling sorry for yourself and do something useful, you could buy Tesla stock, $754.86 9/9/2021, TSLA: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/26/tesla-files-to-become-an-electricity-provider-in-texas.html

• Tesla filed an application with the Texas Public Utility Commission to sell electricity in the state.
• The application follows the start of a big battery build out by Tesla in Angleton, Texas (near Houston), where it aims to connect a 100 megawatt energy storage system to the grid.
• A cold snap seized Texas in February this year, stranding millions of residents without power or water for days on end. The Texas grid is isolated from the rest of the U.S., so transmission of power from other states was not available to relieve those stuck in the cold.

Elon doesn't whine but works to solve problems. In contrast, you just complain away as if it would do any good. Ahhhh, there may be a way blaming China might cool the earth.

Pass a declaration of war demanding an immediate stop to coal burning in China. Then escalate to a nuclear exchange. The subsequent nuclear winter will freeze the survivors. Yea, start your nuclear quarrel ... or grow a pair and do something useful.

Bob Wilson

 

lol. There is no "blame China". It's just a variation of the Prisoner's Dilemma - you know, the scenario where all parties involved are guilty anyways. China is the largest emitter with no signs of reduction in sight. When the US was the largest emitter, people said the same about the US. Things have changed and now its China that's a biggest threat. China is also the single largest financier for coal internationally too, so there's that.
https://ieefa.org/ieefa-china-is-supporting-over-50-of-coal-power-development-in-largest-remaining-project-pipelines/

Like advocate for a carbon tariff on imports? That's at least the point I'm making. If the goal is to make it financially infeasible to use fossil fuels, this is the only way that would directly impact emissions from products imported. It would literally force the economy to prioritize using non-fossil fuels. Is this not correct within Keynesian economic thought?

How is he relevant to the discussion? It's not like he has the influence to turn China around.

Explain to me how ignoring China's emissions is going to help anything? It's not. Can't address anything if it's never pointed out.

 

China's coal burning poisons their own people and land. As for man made global warming, many of their productive lands are subject to sea level rise and severe tropical storms. In contrast, my interest is closer to home. But you might take some hope: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/10/us-biden-china-xi-discuss-avoiding-confrontation.html

It marked the second call between the leaders since Biden took office in January, as tensions between the world’s two largest economies simmer.

“President Biden underscored the United States’ enduring interest in peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific and the world and the two leaders discussed the responsibility of both nations to ensure competition does not veer into conflict,” the White House said in a readout of the call released Friday morning.
...
Xi said in the report that, “on the basis of respecting each other’s core concerns and properly managing differences,” relevant departments of the two countries can engage for cooperation on climate, Covid prevention, economic recovery and major international and regional issues.

He said if there’s “confrontation” between China and the U.S., “both countries and the world will suffer,” while all will benefit if the two nations work together. That’s according to a CNBC translation of the Chinese text.​

So maybe they addressed your "China coal" problem. We know the previous President didn't beyond destruction of trade agreements. So USA farmers had their Chinese market collapse and all goods at Walmart became more expensive.

Bob Wilson

ps.

• dogs = china
• Ginger = Xi

 

Well, talk is cheap. People will criticize China until their emission trends move in a declining direction. So far, it is questionable that that will happen.

 

Finally, something we can agree upon.

Bob Wilson

 

Source: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/09/21/chinas-xi-pledges-to-end-funding-for-overseas-coal-power-plants-513493

Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Tuesday his country would end support for building new coal-fired power plants abroad, a move that would cut off a key source of financing for the fuel most responsible for climate change.

The news: Xi's announcement to the United Nations General Assembly will end the flow of cash from the world's largest public financier to foreign coal projects, and it comes on the heels of similar pledges by Japan and South Korea earlier this year.

"China will step up support for other developing countries in developing green and low-carbon energy, and will not build new coal-fired power projects abroad," Xi told the General Assembly. He did not lay out a timeline to end that financing, but the country has not directed any funding from its Belt and Road Initiative toward coal power plants so far this year.
. . .​

Hopefully this makes everyone happy.

Bob Wilson

 

Maybe China can see as the general public is aware of what they are doing the public will individually seek alternatives actively. No policies or treaties but individuals that will operate under that conclusion for the remainder of they buying days. Rice Fields and idle factories isn't a path to being the super power so at least they have to make it look good and say the right things to gain the ground they want. Have they already done this? I'll let you be the judge of that but there is a lot of evidence helping you asses the situation and we're not talking about what they are saying. That's just propaganda.

 

Talk is cheap unless someone says what you want to hear. lol

No timeline for ending the financing and it won't be known until the end of the year if the Belt & Road Initiative had funding for coal. Who knows if that is the only way China funds coal too.

 

Nobody will actually know what's happening in China without external monitoring - like from satellites. There have been numerous accounts of how China's government just skews data or outright lies about things to cover up what's actually happening.

External pressure may be driving some of China's rhetoric, but we will see what they actually do later on.