Trees and Global Warming

One environmentalist argues that a key to fighting global warming is to use more wood products, stimulating the planting of more new trees. He says that young trees absorb more carbon dioxide than old trees.

To address climate change, we must use more wood, not less. Using wood sends a signal to the marketplace to grow more trees and to produce more wood. That means we can then use less concrete, steel and plastic -- heavy carbon emitters through their production. Trees are the only abundant, biodegradable and renewable global resource.

China's Problems are Our Problems

What is happening on the other side of the world will one day affect our side of the world. A long and detailed article in the NY Times.

But just as the speed and scale of China’s rise as an economic power have no clear parallel in history, so its pollution problem has shattered all precedents. Environmental degradation is now so severe, with such stark domestic and international repercussions, that pollution poses not only a major long-term burden on the Chinese public but also an acute political challenge to the ruling Communist Party. And it is not clear that China can rein in its own economic juggernaut.

Public health is reeling. Pollution has made cancer China’s leading cause of death, the Ministry of Health says. Ambient air pollution alone is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. Nearly 500 million people lack access to safe drinking water.

Chinese cities often seem wrapped in a toxic gray shroud. Only 1 percent of the country’s 560 million city dwellers breathe air considered safe by the European Union....

Environmental woes that might be considered catastrophic in some countries can seem commonplace in China: industrial cities where people rarely see the sun; children killed or sickened by lead poisoning or other types of local pollution; a coastline so swamped by algal red tides that large sections of the ocean no longer sustain marine life.

China is choking on its own success. The economy is on a historic run, posting a succession of double-digit growth rates. But the growth derives, now more than at any time in the recent past, from a staggering expansion of heavy industry and urbanization that requires colossal inputs of energy, almost all from coal, the most readily available, and dirtiest, source.

Interpreting the Middle East

Some interesting observations in this LA Times opinion piece on the clashing worldviews when interpreting the conflicts in the Middle East. I agree with this quote: "ideology cannot be defeated by concessions."

...the Mideast's central conflict is not territorial but ideological. And ideology cannot be defeated by concessions.

Emissaries also still believe that "the Occupation" blocks agreement between Israelis and Palestinians. In the West, the term usually means the territories Israel conquered in the Six-Day War in 1967....

Instead, the heart of the problem is that many Palestinians -- Fatah and Hamas, in particular -- and even some Israeli Arabs use "Occupation" to refer to all Israel.

Ah, The Benefits of Central Planning

This article in the LA Times points out some of the cultural differences between American and Chinese societies, as well as some of the related political differences. Interesting observations.

It sounds good to me to not have to deal with hearings, environmental impact reports, high-priced labor, etc. Maybe LA would have a modern airport if we lived in that kind of environment! BUT, Americans would not give up their right to "participation," even with the accompanying lack of progress.

Primary factors I see in the Chinese ability to make fast and huge changes are:
1. The people's acquiescence to government action because of their belief that the relative good for society outweighs the personal cost they have to bear for progress. A supporting factor for this, but not the dominant factor that Americans would like to think it is, is their lack of recourse. Americans do not understand this profound difference in worldview and values.
2. The minimal cost of labor, which I would guess is roughly $5/day compared to probably $100/day in the US.
3. The lack of checks and balances in their top-down system, which ensures expedient action for decisions made by the leaders.

China seems little hindered by the pressures that plague transit projects in the West.

Financial woes sandbagged New York's Second Avenue subway for about 80 years until ground was broken this spring. L.A.'s subway system, whose westward march was halted at Western Avenue in 1996, has been constricted by environmental, political and financial pressures.

In China, labor is cheap, the land belongs to the government, air pollution is the primary environmental concern, and political pressure moves largely in one direction -- from the Communist Party leadership on down.

"If the government wants to do something, even if the conditions are not ready for it, it will be done," said Zheng Shiling, an influential Chinese architect who teaches at Tongji University in Shanghai.

Realistic Figures for China's Growth

A respected economist points out in this NY Times article how China's growth figures are wildly exaggerated. The point is not to discount China's growth, but to realize that even at a relatively fast pace, it will take a century to catch up with the US economy.

Using those numbers as a guide, if we consider China’s actual electrical use, which is relatively easy to measure, and do a little math, we come up with this estimate: The G.D.P. in China has been growing somewhere between 4.5 percent (using the average for a rapidly growing country) to 6 percent a year (using the highest rate for Japan), not at the 10 percent rate claimed in official statistics.

The official statistic for China’s overall growth rate is best regarded as an approximate growth rate of the economy of its cities.