india is still very much a developing country and, despite actually being fairly ambitious on switching to renewables, should be given a little more space. their per capita is amongst the lowest on the planet.

but, china is arguably now a developed country and should be pressed to commit to comparable levels of responsibility if it wants comparable levels of influence. their emissions exceed their population percentage; they're already emitting beyond their share. i think that's the right argument - if it wants the seat at the big kids table, it needs to act like a big kid.

www.cbc.ca/news/world/cop21-climate-change-talks-saturday-announced-1.3362354

Dee1965
The average Chinese citizen uses 1/5 the energy that the average North American uses. Where do you suggest they cut back?

The pollution from China is coming from its massive production of goods that are sent HERE.

So, how about we cut back to help them cut back?

jessica murray
westerners should cut emissions by around 70%. china should cut emissions by about 30%. we need to cut more than them, but they need to cut deeply, too.

the idea that we could fix this by boycotting goods from china or something would be a nice plan in a market utopia. but, that's not how things work in the real world. so long as their government allows us to export our pollution to them, we will continue to do so. they have to put those standards in place. it may lead to a decrease in exports, but even china is realizing it needs to focus it's economy more on domestic consumption.

it's only a half-truth, anyways. they're building massive cities. and, they're using coal for electricity generation.

Blackbird
Both China and India have the money to do something about their outputs. Why should they be cut any slack.

If you really want to do something for the world, cut down on pollution of all types and spend all this money on research to find an energy source that pollutes less but will provide enough power to meet our constantly growing demand

jessica murray
because india's per capita emissions level is actually lower than most countries in sub-saharan africa. the gross numbers in india seem impressive, but the population is well over a billion and when you split it all up - which does not account for the vast disparities in wealth that exist there - it does not add up to much for the average person. the average indian is still very, very poor and simply does not produce many emissions as a consequence of this poverty.

the indian government has made it clear that it intends to focus as much on renewables as it can, and that is good news. i mean, it simply makes more economic sense to put the infrastructure in place as renewables than it does to swap it out in ten years. and, understand that that is the reality in much of india - they are not converting from carbon, but making the choice as to what kind of energy source they will be implementing for the first time. but there are few places in the world where the argument for lenience is as powerful as it is in india, due to the persistent levels of quite staggering poverty.