Why does everyone blame China for environmental problems?

Question

most of the factories are owned and run by American companies..

the goods they make are demanded by Americans and Europeans..

the guidelines on how to make stuff are set by OUR companies.. (MATEL blamed China for the design flaws.. but it has been determined it was MATELS own design...)

so why do we blame China?? when its US who has told them we want cheaply made stuff...

Answer 1

First off I am not trying to argue with you, but you have a few misconceptions about the factories there. First of all generally the companies here do not own the factories in china, they simply outsource to them, give them their design and negotiate a really cheap price.

Then china who needs to make a profit while being low balled by US companies, pay their employees substandard pay (to US standards that is) and cut every corner they can to turn that profit. This means, no emission standards, dumping toxic waste into nearby neighborhoods and the list goes on.

Now I am not saying blame China, thats just the dynamic of what is happening and ultimately, we, "The Consumer" is to blame from this. We continue to consume at an unsustainable rate demanding lower prices and guess what, the US companies are all to happy to give it to us, but the people of China are the ones who pay the price.

Here is an interesting move about the chain:

http://www.storyofstuff.com/

Answer 2

Americans blame china for environmental problems for the same reason overweight people with heart disease blame fast food and addicts blame crack dealers. It's easier to blame the provider of a harmful service than it is to blame yourself for having no self control.

Answer 3

it's because it's so populated and more population means more resources used, meaning the production of food, oil, usage of  cars etc.

Answer 4

It is important that China clean up it's energy infrastructure.   At the rate they are growing, it could be a big problem.  They have been making moves in that direction.  Recently they announced they would have 10% clean energy by 2020, which is not enough, but it's a start.

Americans should focus on what we can do.  We are the worlds biggest consumer and polluter.  Yes China just passed us in CO2 emissions but that's not the whole story.  Much of what we consume is produced elsewhere, including China.  We have some responsibility for the pollution involved there.  

"The United States consumes one-fourth of the world's energy. China, India, Germany, Japan and Bangladesh have a combined population of 2.9 billion, and together consume less energy than the United States, with a population of 290 million."

-One tenth as many people.

http://www.logicalscience.com

We have good enough technology now to replace fossil fuel energy with alternatives.  Solar and Wind could provide the bulk of the energy.

Solar PV or Photovoltaic cells are quickly improving in efficiency and cost.

Industry experts are saying they can reach grid parity in a few years. Grid parity meaning competitive with coal and gas.  

Here's how close the cutting edge is.

"Nanosolar’s founder and chief executive, Martin Roscheisen, claims to be the first solar panel manufacturer to be able to profitably sell solar panels for less than $1 a watt. That is the price at which solar energy becomes less expensive than coal.

With a $1-per-watt panel,” he said, “it is possible to build $2-per-watt systems.

According to the Energy Department, building a new coal plant costs about $2.1 a watt, plus the cost of fuel and emissions, he said."

from http://www.grinzo.com/energy/index.php/c...

Solar thermal power plants that use the sun's heat to generate steam to generate electricity are another technology with huge potential and low price.  These would be built in the southwest, in fact they already are being built.

Scientific American  A Solar Grand Plan

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-so...  

A plan that could power the whole country with solar power plants in the southwest.

Ausra has just signed a power purchase agreement with Northern California's PG&E to build the world's first CLFR plant at 177 MW near California's Central Coast.

Solel is to construct a 553 MW complex of parabolic trough power plants in the Mojave Desert to fulfill a 25-year power purchase agreement with PG&E.

BrightSource Energy just signed a 900 MW power purchase agreement with PG&E for power from plants it will build in the Mojave desert.

"The same acre can produce 10 times as much energy from wind as it can from corn ethanol, 180,000 miles per acre per year. But both corn ethanol and wind power pale in comparison with solar photovoltaic, which can produce more than 2 million miles worth of transport per acre per year."   http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1454...

"Solar is one the most land-efficient sources of clean power we have, using a fraction of the area needed by hydro or wind projects of comparable output. All of America's needs for electric power – the entire US grid, night and day – can be generated with Ausra's current technology using a square parcel of land 92 miles on a side. For comparison, this is less than 1% of America's deserts, less land than currently in use in the U.S. for coal mines."

http://www.ausra.com

http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1444...

Using mirrors to focus the sun's heat on one of any various heat-to-electricity converters seems to have separated itself out as being the cheapest form of solar power.

Photovoltaics work okay in a fairly diverse spectrum of available sunlight.

Solar thermal needs more intense sunlight, like in our southwest.  And solar thermal works best in fairly large power plants, of 100 megawatts or more.  

Read more here.

http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/

Wind

"There are areas in Denmark and Germany who use more than 40 percent of their electricity from wind.   From what I have read, they are less concerned about the intermittency than we are in the United States even though we aren't at 1 pecent yet.   Why?   Because we are told by the fossil fuel guys, hey, can't use wind, can't use solar, what about the intermittency.   If wind gets up to 40 percent of the electricity we use and solar gets up to 40 of the electricity we use, the other percents of electricity we need can be made up from the fossil fuel plants that are still there.  If they are run less at full power, they can last a long time.  That can be your electricity `battery.'"

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/1/...

Denmark gets 20% of their energy from wind.

"In the US, the American Wind Energy Association forecasts that installed capacity could grow from 11,603 MW today to around 100,000 MW by 2020. In Canada, Emerging Energy Research predicts that installed wind capacity will expand from around 1,500 MW today to around 14,000 MW by 2015."

{from an article at altenergystocks.com by Charles Morand}

It could grow faster with more incentives like tax credits.  Alternative energy, as a whole, receives a miniscule amount of public money compared to the fossil fuel industry.

http://www.setamericafree.org/blueprint....

A Blueprint For U.S. Energy Security

Shows how it can be done.

http://www.pluginpartners.org/

Plug in hybrids would get 100mpg for the average American driver.  This site makes the point that they would save an enormous amount of fuel.

And as they and electrics are phased in, the energy grid will be getting cleaner.  Using the grid to charge them is already cleaner, overall, than burning gasoline or diesel.

Answer 5

i have this thing againest china they drive bad and arent nice to americans driving is their weakness .

Answer 6

good point...but products made in china are inferior