Java Jive wrote:
But if, following your bad example, we say to the Chinese: "You are
producing too much CO2!" they will just say to us: "Per capita, you
produce twice as much as us! Don't lecture to us at least until
you've taken your own population in hand!"

We won't ever get out of this hole by pointing the finger at each
other crying like children: "It's not me, Miss, it's him!". The only
way we are ever going to get out of it is by acting together each to
do what we can. Your post is counter-productive to that process.

Well, I'm terribly sorry about that, but the point I was replying to was:

60 million people doing anything would easily have a big effect.

and that's what I dealt with.

The possibility of a global agreement, when China, India and the USA don't
seem in the least inclined to join in, seems pretty remote. If they don't
agree swingeing cuts and implement them, anything we do in Britain is
totally irrelevant, so it's pointless trying, and paying a high price for
doing so. It's like volunteering to starve ten years before anyone else
sees the need.

Moreover, if you think Britain carries any weight in this area, you're sadly
and utterly mistaken. Look at how small we are on the map. We have just 1%
of the world's population, and are responsible for just 2% of its pollution.
As President Mugabe said about Gordon Brown, we are just a tiny little dot.

Sure, we'll join in if and when the big boys organise themselves, but if
they don't we're doomed anyway, so we might as well party in the meantime.



On Wed, 16 Sep 2009 19:48:29 +0100, "Norman Wells"
wrote:

If the whole of the UK sank overnight, never to inconvenience another
electron, China's increase in electricity generation at present
rates would negate that in under a year.

So, 60 million people saving, say, even an unlikely quarter of their
domestic electricity consumption, which in itself is only a third of
all the electricity consumption in the UK, would be negated by China
in under a month. And China is just one of the countries of the
world increasing its power consumption year on year. Add in India,
Brazil and Russia, and you're probably talking of delaying global
warming if everyone here 'did something', by 10 days at most.

You may call that a 'big effect'. I call it trivial.