Carbon emissions are pretty much linked to wealth: people who can’t afford a car, holidays overseas or imported avocados have a lower carbon footprint than those who can.
It would be interesting to compare that map to a GDP per capita map: the correlation would be very high.
There is, however, a fundamental flaw in all such charts: they ignore child birth rates. The single worst thing anyone can do from an environmental perspective is to have a baby.
Yes. It’s mentioned in the article. No massive surprises but a few little ones like Belgium coming in quite high.
Belgium is in the top twenty in global GDP per capita.
But ranks the highest co2 emissions in Europe after Malta. So it doesnt quite follow. Oil producers rank highest. No surprise there.
What does Singapore do to get on top of those rankings, above the 4 oil producers?
Annex Saudi Arabia.
Electrical power generation is mostly oil. Singapore is an advanced economy so it uses a good deal of electricity, despite being fairly energy efficient.
I suppose if aviation is included, then being an aviation hub they would be hit quite badly by that too…
https://x.com/volcaholic1/status/1851257796341236117
https://x.com/volcaholic1/status/1851336771373543887
https://x.com/Wh_So_Serious/status/1851348310134858020
https://x.com/volcaholic1/status/1851341883726766348
Yeah, you dont expect rain like in Valencia, but more on the plains
My thoughts are with all those affected.
A smidge of good news
Side effect of the Ukraine war. Germany in particular has made dramatic investments in energy efficiency and renewable generation.
Really only goes to show, most things are simply a matter of political will/desire.
This was also tied to the closure of the final nuclear plants, which I thought was a rather bad idea, however the effect seems to be the opposite of what I thought.
At the moment, they are looking at putting some wind turbines in the forest where we live. There is opposition from the usual NIMBYs but I think it is a great idea - as long as they aren’t compromising the forestry.
How much of that was related to the war in Ukraine? I thought it odd timing for the closures given the spike in energy prices at the time and had thought it must have had something in part to do with having to buy fuel for the reactors from Russia or something (I havent a clue whether they do or not) - otherwise why not extend their life for a year or two until gas prices had fallen back again?
Very little, as the plan to close the reactors was made after the Fukushima disaster.
There was a slight delay to close the last 3 due to the Ukraine situation, but that was merely over the winter period of 2022/23. They had a big gathering to mark the closing of the Emsland plant at the hotel that my son works at. Apparently, Grünen politicians are the best tippers!
I suspect that a completely renewable energy policy needs a different model. Essentially, having massive over-capacity with sufficient disgressional consumption to keep the producers operational and profitable.
I’m wondering if it will end up being more decentralised to perhaps a per-household generation basis with individual buildings and localised district networks e.g. by solar panels for the former and wind power for the latter…