Not just more from a total spend perspective, but more as a % GDP.

http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/newsdesk/energy/analysis/china-actually-doing-more-tackle-climate-change-uk

Interesting.

They know it’s a real threat to their future prosperity, but have the economic growth that no western economy has to support measures without cutting into budgets for other things. In the west, we seem too worried what we’ll have to give up to adapt, without really cottoning on that we’ll have to give up considerably more if we don’t.

i do find China fascinating.

their whole way of government is set up to ensure that nothing can change.

result = one of the most dynamic countries in the world right now.

our whole way of government is set up to ensure that we can change everything on a whim.

result = same old sh** decade in decade out.

I’ve never thought of it like that. How depressing 🙁

May have something to do with the fact that all UK pollies are worried about is which cushy job they’ll get when they’ve been booted out of the cushy job they’re in.

Given the amount of air pollution China create versus the UK I’d guess that we’re still ahead in real terms.

I think we did our bit in the Victorian era, fortunately we now just get everything from China so now its down to them.

Given the amount of air pollution China create versus the UK I’d guess that we’re still ahead in real terms.

Depends when you start counting from. I’d guess it would be pretty close if you consider historical emissions since we started burning coal.

That, and the fact that most of China’s emissions are the west’s by proxy.

disadvantages of democracy innit

Would high taxes on fuel and other carbon creating things actually result in
1. People voting for you
2. People voting against you

Mao was right – benign dictatorship FTW 😉

Also lots of very greedy right wing capitalist like Lawson spending lots to denounce the science and muddy the waters.

Amazing how many still dont accept climate change and how many dont accept it may be due to man-its almost never anyone with a background in the science never mind the subject

Mao was right – benign dictatorship FTW

I wonder if there’s ever been one? Genuine question…

the general population will eventually find a way to get improved workers rights through trade unions.
then they will be told that everyone can have a better life.

does that particular cul-de-sac of progress remind anyone of anything?

stand by to lend them some serious money in about 30yrs, and your grandchildrens future is safe.

does that particular cul-de-sac of progress remind anyone of anything?

No. You’ll have to explain it to us.

ransos – Member

Mao was right – benign dictatorship FTW

I wonder if there’s ever been one? Genuine question… [quote]

Guess Cuba is pretty close – good education, good healthcare, low personal wealth, seemingly happy people.

Guess Cuba is pretty close – good education, good healthcare, low personal wealth, seemingly happy people.

This

Guess Cuba is pretty close – good education, good healthcare, low personal wealth, seemingly happy people.

No inward investment, no outward investment, no free speech, reduced to trading with North Korea. Sounds idyllic…

1. China’s leadership understands engineering

In China, eight of the nine members of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau, including the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, have engineering degrees; one has a degree in geology.

Of the 15 U.S. cabinet members, six have law degrees. Only one cabinet member has a hard-science degree — Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1997, has a doctorate in physics. President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have law degrees.

no idea how many UK senior politicians did science or engineering. Thatcher was an industrial Chemist though.

i’m not sure what that proves.

Guess Cuba is pretty close – good education, good healthcare, low personal wealth, seemingly happy people.

Interestingly, they’re maybe the only country in the world to have gone post-peak oil. The collapse of the USSR (who supplied their fuel)and US refusal to trade caused complete turmoil, but they seem to have come out the other side in reasonable shape.

I don’t think Castro could be described as benign though.

No inward investment, no outward investment,

you mean they are not capitalist and America bans anyone form trading with them

no free speech,

No tea party or BNP or Nazis

Sounds idyllic…

well it has it weaknesses just like democracy

If the US hadn’t been so paranoid when Castro overthrew Batista and treated them like any other country, it may have been an even nicer place.

Spent time in the industrial centres of China and it’s a bizarre place – some of the working conditions are straight out of a Dickens novel.

Mao was right – benign dictatorship FTW

And millions dead , but its ok now eh 🙂

seemingly happy people.

Can they afford a Santa Cruz Bronson carbon with ENVE rims?
If not, I’m out. 😉

Back on topic, China’s pollution levels are off the scale, so they have a huge amount to do just to come up to Western standards, so spending all that money won’t necessarily make them world class.

I was working there in 2003 and the soot from Coal fired power stations, in the middle of towns, was quite incredible, everything was covered in it, including all the vegetation. Your clothes would run black when you washed them!

Back on topic, China’s pollution levels are off the scale, so they have a huge amount to do just to come up to Western standards, so spending all that money won’t necessarily make them world class.

True, but a lot of those emissions are a result of making goods for us.

footflaps – Member

Back on topic, China’s pollution levels are off the scale, so they have a huge amount to do just to come up to Western standards, so spending all that money won’t necessarily make them world class.

but we all love the cheap things they make, yes?

They have a great animal rights record. Almost singlehandedly responsible for a number of endangered species.

Almost singlehandedly responsible for a number of endangered species.

Not as many as the West though I’d imagine.

Guess Cuba is pretty close – good education, good healthcare, low personal wealth, seemingly happy people.

That would be why so many are trying to get out. The cubans I know (and I’ve worked with quite a few) don’t seem too keen on Castro+chums – although they’re obviously unlikely to be happy, if they liked him they probably would have stayed.

Cuba is also being propped up by Venezuela, if they decided to cut off the cheap oil they’d be in serious trouble.

I’d say China is probably a more benign dictatorship than Cuba, although neither has a political system I’d particularly want to live under.

Not just more from a total spend perspective, but more as a % GDP.

More per head of population though?

Not as many as the West though I’d imagine.

Tigers (Siberian), Leopards, Sharks, Rhinos and no doubt Elephants soon the way they’re currently going.

Threatened species aside, 30,000 bears in cages with extraction tubes (bile) in their gall bladders their entire lives for “traditional Chinese medicine”…..

Almost singlehandedly responsible for a number of endangered species.

I disagree but plenty of countries have poor records
[ lots of animals on the list to be fair]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_endangered_and_protected_species_of_China

As one of the world’s most biodiverse countries and its most populous, China is home to a significant number of wildlife species vulnerable to or in danger of local extinction due to the impact of human activity.[1][2] Under the Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Protection of Wildlife, the national and local governments are required to designate rare or threatened species for special protection under the law. The type of legal protection that a particular species in China enjoys may depend on the locality of administration. For example, the Beijing Municipal Government designates the red fox, wild boar, leopard cat and masked palm civet, which are found in the wilderness around the municipality, as local Class I protected species even though none are among the Class I or II protected species designated by the national government.[3]

China is a signatory country to the CITES and the national government’s protected species list generally follows the designation of endangered species by CITES, but also includes certain species that are rare in the country but quite common in other parts of the world so as not to be considered globally threatened (such as moose and beaver) or are vulnerable to economic exploitation thus require legal protection (such as sable and otter). The Chinese endangered species classifications are updated relatively infrequently, and a number of species deemed to be endangered by international bodies have not yet been so recognized in China. These species include several that are endemic to the country such as the Groove-toothed flying squirrel and the Ili Pika.

Big long list of protected areas

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_areas_of_China

How many animal experiments have we done for Western medicine?

True, but a lot of those emissions are a result of making goods for us.

Their main source of power is pretty dirty coal and they don’t bother with any filtration on the smoke stacks so you get incredible amounts of particles as well as sulphur dioxide etc. At the West has been cleaning up their act for some time with regard to coal emissions eg filtration, SOx and NOx reduction etc.

How many animal experiments have we done for Western medicine?

Way way less than the Chinese have been responsible for killing for medicine, I’d wager.

But in the West our hands are pretty bloody. Buffalo, passenger pigeons, big game hunting, tiger hunting etc etc which were all killed just for the hell of it, and let’s not forget we managed to exterminate almost ALL the large animals from the UK. That’s aside from many many species big and small we’ve killed through habitat loss. There is virtually nothing left of this country’s natural environment in its original condition.

There is virtually nothing left of this country’s natural environment in its original condition.

Pre or post ice age?

I’d say Man has a pretty insignificant affect in the grand scheme of things e.g. ask a Dinosaur what he thinks about climate change.

Any of it.

The natural environment here is not farmers fields, never has been.

Way way less than the Chinese have been responsible for killing for medicine, I’d wager.

Accurate global figures for animal testing are difficult to obtain. The British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) estimates that 100 million vertebrates are experimented on around the world every year, 10–11 million of them in the European Union.[18] The Nuffield Council on Bioethics reports that global annual estimates range from 50 to 100 million animals. None of the figures include invertebrates such as shrimp and fruit flies.[57] Animals bred for research then killed as surplus, animals used for breeding purposes, and animals not yet weaned are also not included in the figures.[3]

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the total number of animals used in that country in 2005 was almost 1.2 million,[58] but this does not include rats and mice, which make up about 90% of research animals.[59][60] In 1995, researchers at Tufts University Center for Animals and Public Policy estimated that 14–21 million animals were used in American laboratories in 1992, a reduction from a high of 50 million used in 1970.[61] In 1986, the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment reported that estimates of the animals used in the U.S. range from 10 million to upwards of 100 million each year, and that their own best estimate was at least 17 million to 22 million.[62]

In the UK, Home Office figures show that 3.2 million procedures were carried out in 2007, a rise of 189,500 since the previous year. Four thousand procedures used non-human primates, down 240 from 2006.[63] A “procedure” refers to an experiment that might last minutes, several months, or years. Most animals are used in only one procedure: animals either die because of the experiment or are euthanized afterwards

which is largest is a mute point and I assume we can agree its a mixed bag from the west or from China

Either way the point is neither can exactly mount a high horse

I’d say Man has a pretty insignificant affect in the grand scheme of things e.g. ask a Dinosaur what he thinks about climate change.

❓

I’d say Man has a pretty insignificant affect in the grand scheme of things e.g. ask a Dinosaur what he thinks about climate change.

You reckon? They’re breeding ever further north, some species are flourishing and others are suffering.

Telegraph link, but still an example of how dinosaurs are adapting: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/10044960/British-birds-benefit-from-climate-change.html

You reckon?

Absolutely.

E.g take the Lake District, humans have been responsible for the removal of forests, large scale farming etc. The last ice age ripped off the top few 100m of rock and created the valleys, lakes etc that we’re discussing change to. I’d say compared to an ice age, man has barely scraped the surface (literally).

I am surprised to hear people talking about a lack of change in China. IMO it is hard to imagine a society that is undergoing more change. The whole basis of economic growth is in transformation as China struggles to move from an investment led economy to a domestic, consumption driven one. This is having a massive impact on all aspects of society and challenging the natural propensity to save not spend.

And you think banking problems were reserved for the western economies…..just wait for the unravelling of the largely hidden financial mess in China.

It is just a question of scale blowing up the planet is utterly insignificant in terms of the universe but it would be a significant change to our habitat.
Your example is insignificant compared to the impact that created the moon.

I was working there in 2003 and the soot from Coal fired power stations, in the middle of towns, was quite incredible, everything was covered in it, including all the vegetation. Your clothes would run black when you washed them!

Welcome to 10 years later.