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Japan CO2 emissions

TBS News uses balloons to illustrate how other countries emit a lot more carbon dioxide than Japan:

The announcer notes that the Japanese government’s unilateral decision to cut its CO2 emissions won’t have much of an effect unless other big countries take similar steps.
—

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27 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - October 10, 2009 at 7:35 am

Categories: General Japan Tags: climate change, co2, global warming

http://dimesfornickels.wordpress.com/ William George

The announcer notes that the Japanese government’s unilateral decision to cut its CO2 emissions won’t have much of an effect unless other big countries take similar steps.

This is true. But that doesn’t mean Japan shouldn’t do it.

http://www.ippoippo.net/blog GavinT

Agreed!
We get the same arguments in the UK as well, and if I recall correctly, the UK emissions are in the same ballpark as Japan.

Then you get people arguing about historic and total emissions which ends up putting the UK and US way ahead of everyone else.

But in the end, it doesn’t really matter. We should all get on and do something about it.

Also, even if you don’t accept the view of man-made global warming, we should be reducing our dependance on fossil fuels from an energy security point of view. Japan has very few fossil fuel reserves, nowhere near enough to sustain the country. (The UK’s oil and gas reserves have already peaked and are decline, and we are no longer a net energy provider).

longus dickus

i am for the natural way. let us mess our nature like before and the nature will solve it by itself alone.

Mr. USA

Is this CO2 per capita? If it isn’t, Japan is the smallest country of the ones listed, so shouldn’t we expect it to have the lowest emissions?

helical

The numbers below the balloon are in billions of tons, so it seems to be the total amount for the country (for 2007).

Japan has roughly a little less than half the population of the United States and has the industrial infrastructure to support it, so it doesn’t seem odd that it would be listed as being in the top 5.

longus dickus

hmmm and whats about India and Russian Federation?

helical

India has the second largest population in the world, nine times that of Japan and trailing only China, and Russia’s population is only a little over that of Japan but it was a superpower that once rivaled the United States so they probably have the infrastructure as well.

India probably hasn’t started with the mad dash industrialization for the entire country like China has, but once it gets started, one can only imagine how much more CO2 would be added to the atmosphere each year for the world …
longus dickus

and Russia’s population is only a little over that of Japan but it was a superpower that once rivaled the United States so they probably have the infrastructure as well.—

1: it was Soviet Union
2:you know nothing about India, China and the topic you are trying to speak about–
helical

I stand corrected regarding the semantics of the Russia and the USSR.

India has 1.1 billion people, yet it emits roughly the same amount of CO2 as Japan with 120 million.
I inferred that there is not much heavy indusry there yet nor are there much cars per capita and the infrastructure that accompanies it. Unless of course they’re actually a hyper-advanced nation with green tech eons ahead of anything the rest of the world has and I wasn’t told about it.

It’s a well known fact that China is surging ahead at break-neck speeds with economic development today.
Though they have plans to build dozens of nuclear power plants, the current demand for electricity is met with cheap but dirty coal plants which contributes significantly to their national CO2 output. Unless of course it’s all just a facade and they burn CO2-making bonfires when everyone else is not looking to pretend they have a rapidly developing industry and I wasn’t told about it.

But all this is just crazy-talk because I know nothing.
longus dickus

you still dont know what you are talking about.
aside that you are wrong about Russia, Russian Federation and USSR.
helical

Care to enlighten me then?
The Overthinker

“you still dont [sic] know what you are talking about.”

Your logic and rhetorical skill overwhelm me. How to counter such a riposte?
longus dickus

Care to enlighten me then?

why should i teach you about history, geopolitical and economical developmend of last 50 years in a internet topic what you not learned in the shool last 20 years? seriously, isnt to much for one topic here?

–Your logic and rhetorical skill overwhelm me. How to counter such a riposte?–

yehhaa.. becuz im british expensive teached and arrogant idiot from some elite univercity pretending that everything can be solved by logic and rethorical skills.. yopyop, off you go my “best of the best”!

pixel_bomber

It is not per capita. So I think Japans reduction would not be insignificant at all. China has something like 10 time the population of Japan but only 5 times the CO2 emissions. It seems like if any of the top five made significant cuts if would be a major impact. Of course I could be wrong cause I suck at math.

Personally I feel like Japan does a lot more than anyone else already. Living without central heating and AC was a pretty big shock when I moved here. That on top of the tedious garbage sorting/recycling is pretty major compared to the US. I certainly feel like I am doing my part by adapting.
Ajapa

Wikipedia entries:
List of countries by carbon dioxide emissions per capita
List of countries by ratio of GDP to carbon dioxide emissions

Among OECD members, Australia, Canada, and US are grouped into the group of largest amount of carbon dioxide emissions per capita. Germany, Japan, and UK are second largest group but not so much deviates from the OECD average. France and Sweden are in the group of smallest amount of emissions. The same grouping stands also for “GDP per emissions” efficiency.

China, India, and Russia are not good in respect of efficiency, GDP per emissions is not good, worse than Canada. Emissions per capita is lower than most of OECD countries for China and especially India, but Russia is comparable with Japan.

http://www.sixmats.com sixmats

I’m glad that Japan is taking steps to reduce CO2. Next on the list should be reducing the use of plastics.
aussie

so japan is number 5 in the world, this tv show is neglecting to state that japan is no5 out of a total of 210 countries in the world. in this respect it is very high.

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

anti

You have to consider the population. Australia has 20 million? 30? Yet Australia gives out more CO2 than countries with a bigger population. Though not exactly the same, here is 1 list over eco friendly countries.

http://www.ecofriendlydaily.com/news/friendly-countries/

longus dickus

thats becuz Australia has the biggest Kangeroo and Cow populations. they do poop too!

Ajapa

Compare in per capita emission amount of carbon dioxide. Among the OECD members, US, Canada, and Australia have long been listed in unusually high emission countries. Japan is relatively high but still comparable with Germany and UK. Japan’s carbon dioxide emission (per capita) is much higher than other countries like France, but I think, Japan still stay within normal range from the OECD average.

The reason why people in, US, Canada, and Australia, have been emitting so much carbon dioxide compared with other OECD countries, seems to originate in the difference of strategy after the oil crisis in 70′s. Many European countries and Japan had started improving efficiency of their energy use.

anti

Ganbare Hatoyama. Japan is a highly advanced industrialized country, now if they can show the world how to reduce CO2, Japan will be a highly repsected country and I am sure other countries will follow in Japan´s foot steps. It remains to be seen if Japan can live up to the promises. I hope Japan can.
http://witzl.blogspot.com/ MaryWitzl

I’ll have a LOT of respect for Hatoyama if he can pull this off.

Having lived in the U.S., Japan, and the U.K., I can vouch for Japan’s relative energy-saving consciousness. After seventeen years of recycling, hanging laundry out to dry, washing my own dishes and using public transport on a daily basis, I am an energy-saving convert. Every trip I take back to the States makes me wish we could adopt some of the good practices people take for granted in Japan. Even the U.K., which in my subjective experience tends to be more ecologically conscious than America, doesn’t come close to Japan. If things get even better there, more power to Hatoyama.
longus dickus

just build offshore wind parks and everything will be OK!

Niels

Off-shore wind parks VS Typhoon season?
That would be an interesting match to see.

longus dickus

yeahh… one typhoon will deliver energy for the whole year!

sublight

CO2 tends to rise with industrial output, so comparing CO2 emissions to GDP rather than just population may be a better comparison of environmental efficiency. By that measure, Japan has the lowest emissions of the industrialized countries, at about 1kg/$, while Russia produces about 6 times as much for every dollar of GDP.

longus dickus

becuz russia has clima of alaska…

Japan CO2 emissions

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