Why the EPA Chief Needs China’s Help to Tackle Global Warming

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/51640646@N04/11211494325/in/photolist-i5HQEi-i5HUeU">U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Los Angeles District</a>/Flickr

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy is in China this week for her first international trip as the head of the agency. During her four-day tour she’ll stop by Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong and will meet with her counterparts in the Chinese government to discuss how the two countries might reduce their carbon footprint. “The U.S. and China represent the world’s largest economies, the world’s largest energy consumers, and the world’s largest emitters of carbon pollution,” McCarthy said last week in a speech previewing her trip. “I’d rather not be the largest energy consumers or the largest emitters of carbon pollution, but since we are we’re going to get together and we’re going to talk.”

The world better hope the planet’s two dominant superpowers can find a way to curb their pollution. The US, which is responsible for much of the rise in emissions during the twentieth century, is certainly one of the world’s leading villains when it comes to global warming. But China is now, by far, the world’s top producer of climate-destroying pollutants. The country claimed the top spot in global carbon emissions in 2007, nabbing the reins from the US. (To be fair to China, the US emits far more carbon per capita.)

Combined, China and the US produce nearly half of the world’s carbon emissions. This chart breaks down the percentage of global CO2 emissions from 2008 by country:

 

 

China once lagged far behind the other major polluters in the world. But as this chart from the Yale Forum on Climate Change and the Media shows, the country’s emissions have risen steeply ever since the late 1990s:

 

 

As things stand, China’s exponential increase in emissions won’t abate anytime soon. Even as the country leads research in renewable energy and explores a carbon tax, it’s not enough. “Over the next two decades or so, China will belch out nearly as much CO2 as it did over the entire previous 160 years combined,” the Economist wrote last month.

Carbon emissions from the US have leveled off and even dropped slightly in recent years, thanks to increased fuel efficiency in cars and cheaper natural gas. Good news, but the US will need to reduce, not just flat line, its carbon use if the worst calamities of global warming—cities wiped out by rising sea levels, volatile storms, droughts, etc.—are to be averted. But even if US politicians can muster the will to pass meaningful legislation tackling climate change, it will all be for naught if China’s emissions rate continues to skyrocket.

 

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate