A report by the Carnegie Institution of Science revealed that the EU was “outsourcing” a fraction of its emissions to developing countries like China and India. The present policy stated that local consumers must be responsible for the penalties and consequences of emissions. In other words if people are serious about global warming then the cost of carbon has to be factored into the retail price of manufactured goods.
In Switzerland’s case, the amount of emissions that occurred outside the country exceeded that of emissions that occurred within due to its spending on imported products. Similarly, 11 percent of the USA’s entire consumption-based emission was also outsourced to other countries.
Ken Cladeira, the report’s author, asserted that it must be acknowledged that the outcome highlighted must be re-evaluated in future global arrangements.
He said: “Where CO2 emissions occur doesn’t matter to the climate system. Effective policy must have global scope”.
“To the extent that constraints on developing countries’ emissions are the major impediment to effective international climate policy, allocating responsibility for some portion of these emissions to final consumers elsewhere may represent an opportunity for compromise.”
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[...] A report by the Carnegie Institution of Science revealed that the EU was “outsourcing” a fraction of its emissions to developing countries like China and India. The present policy stated that local consumers must be responsible for the penalties and consequences of emissions. In other words if people are serious about global warming then the cost of carbon has to be factored into the retail price of manufactured goods…more [...]