{"id":366118,"date":"2025-02-14T17:53:46","date_gmt":"2025-02-14T16:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=366118"},"modified":"2025-02-14T17:53:49","modified_gmt":"2025-02-14T16:53:49","slug":"why-overturning-net-zero-hurts-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=366118","title":{"rendered":"Why Overturning Net Zero Hurts\u00a0China"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Science Matters<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0Ron Clutz<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

As the image suggests, the push for Net Zero burdens western nations, but benefits China and Russia in different ways.\u00a0 Russia pays lip service to the CO2 phobia, while its scientists and climate modelers know that any global warming will be modest and a boon to their high latitude country.\u00a0 Thus, any economic and military self-destruction by other powers increases Russia\u2019s position and security.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

China\u2019s gains from the Net Zero obsession have been greater and different.\u00a0 First of all, China is protected from emissions reductions and economic development there can proceed unimpeded.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Secondly, and more significantly China has bet the house to be the dominant global supplier of \u201cGreen\u201d energy hardware like wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles and batteries.\u00a0 Their great success makes them vulnerable should the rest of the world realize these are impractical solutions for an imaginary problem.\u00a0 Walter Russell Mead explains in his article\u00a0Trump Outsmarts China on Green Energy.<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0 Excerpts in italics with my bolds and added images.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By dismantling the net-zero agenda, he ramps up economic pressure on Beijing<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So much is happening so quickly in Washington these days that Donald Trump\u2019s war on the green climate agenda has passed almost unnoticed<\/strong>. Steps like pulling out of the Paris Agreement, dropping electric-vehicle mandates, ending offshore leasing for wind projects, and fast-tracking fossil-fuel infrastructure would have dominated the news in quieter times.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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But Mr. Trump\u2019s climate policy matters<\/strong> for reasons that go beyond the climate debate<\/strong>. China has made Western climate policy a major focus of its economic strategy, and by pulling the rug out from under the global green agenda<\/strong>, the Trump administration is adding significantly to the economic pressure on Beijing.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Call it brilliant Chinese planning or gross Western incompetence, but the only real winner from the green agenda<\/strong> that Western governments have done so much to impose on the world is Beijing<\/strong>. Solar power cells, wind turbines, electric vehicles and the batteries that keep them moving: China has swiftly established dominance in one critical industry and supply chain after another.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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This diagram shows the origin of the\u00a0metals required for meeting the 2030 goals.<\/strong>\u00a0The\u00a0left<\/strong>\u00a0side of the diagram shows the\u00a0origin<\/strong>, based on today\u2019s global production of metals. The\u00a0right<\/strong>\u00a0side shows the\u00a0cumulative metal demand<\/strong>\u00a0for wind and solar technologies until 2030. From study showing tonnage of Dutch demand only.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

This was eminently\u00a0foreseeable<\/strong>. The Chinese Communist Party\u2019s\u00a0economic planners in Beijing are the most effective technocrats<\/strong>\u00a0the world has ever known, eclipsing the fumbling Soviet planners of the Khrushchev and Brezhnev eras. Give them a set of targets, a timetable and a list of technologies to promote, and they will coordinate state policy, banking subsidies and market forces to produce world-beating industries in record time.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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China\u2019s production capacity for these materials and components dwarfs the rest of the world \u2013 exceeding global demand in many cases. Source: James Kennedy\u00a0https:\/\/us.docworkspace.com\/d\/sIAGK_NAjoOC-lAY<\/a><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The European and American architects of the green transition were
unintentionally creating a playing field ideally suited to China\u2019s core
strengths, and Beijing took full advantage.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even the most brilliant planners make mistakes<\/strong>. China today is a combination of extraordinary economic and industrial success and monumental failure.<\/strong> The ruinous demographic consequences of its one-child policy,<\/strong> the explosive mix of financial and social pressures wrapped up in the real-estate bubble<\/strong>, and the excess industrial capacity<\/strong> resulting from decades of aggressive state planning loom ever larger over China\u2019s future. Mr. Trump\u2019s proposed upending of global climate policy would transform China\u2019s drive to dominate the energy transition from a major win to an expensive misfire for Beijing.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The\u00a0net-zero agenda<\/strong>, a set of targets and strategies by Western governments and climate diplomats to arrest global warming by limiting emissions, is the\u00a0most audacious international effort<\/strong>\u00a0in diplomatic history. It seeks to persuade or\u00a0compel every country on the planet to make a transition to energy<\/strong>\u00a0production\u00a0that does not add carbon dioxide<\/strong>\u00a0to the atmosphere. The\u00a0costs<\/strong>\u00a0of the transition easily run into the\u00a0trillions of dollars.<\/strong>\u00a0The social and economic impact will\u00a0transform everything<\/strong>\u00a0from agriculture to manufacturing.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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An enterprise this ambitious requires enduring political support. As time goes by, the costs of the energy transition inexorably rise, and opposition to the project grows as more interests are affected<\/strong>. Proponents understood this and counted on three factors to ensure<\/strong> that progress toward net zero<\/strong> continued even as opponents dug in their heels.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

1. Blame Natural Disasters on CO2 Emissions<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, as the growing costs of climate change ricocheted through the economy (driving up insurance costs in disaster-prone areas, for example, as weather risks grew), more voters would support net-zero policies.<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

2. Green Industries Lobby to Protect Their Interests<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Second, industries that had invested in climate-friendly technologies (like automobile makers investing billions in EV-producing factories) would lobby politicians to protect their investments<\/strong> by maintaining the regulations and subsidies that made them profitable.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

3.  Workers Wanting to protect their Green Jobs.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Third, as net-zero-friendly industries employed more workers<\/strong>, these beneficiaries of net-zero<\/strong> policies would support measures that protected their jobs.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will those be enough to stop the rising wave of energy realism and loss of Net Zero faith?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Wright is now confirmed as US Secretary of Energy<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
EPA priorities Announced by Director Zeldin<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the image suggests, the push for Net Zero burdens western nations, but benefits China and Russia in different ways.\u00a0 Russia pays lip service to the CO2 phobia, while its scientists and climate modelers know that any global warming will be modest and a boon to their high latitude country.\u00a0 Thus, any economic and military self-destruction by other powers increases Russia\u2019s position and security.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":366151,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691819450,691829997,691818341,691818901,691818618,691833297,691818154],"class_list":{"0":"post-366118","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-green-energy-2","9":"tag-carbon-dioxide-co","10":"tag-china","11":"tag-climate-modelers","12":"tag-energy-transition","13":"tag-green-climate-agenda","14":"tag-net-zero","16":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/02060-china.webp?fit=1600%2C900&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1xf8","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":256358,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=256358","url_meta":{"origin":366118,"position":0},"title":"China, 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