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Posted on 02/13/2026 8:08:41 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Irresponsible Trump, responsible China: that is the message the BBC’s climate editor seemed to be sending us by juxtaposing the news that the President had repealed Barack Obama’s “endangerment finding” and that China’s carbon emissions fell slightly last year. Trump’s critics like to portray him as a rogue figure in a world which is otherwise committed to reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. But is there any truth in that?
The endangerment finding was a piece of legalese issued in a 2009 ruling by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). It stated that six greenhouse gases – carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride – are a danger to human health on the grounds that excessive concentrations of them in the air contribute to global warming and all kinds of meteorological disasters. There are valid criticisms to be made of many of the assertions, such as its appearing to point the finger at carbon emissions for more intense hurricanes.
Even now, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says it is too premature to conclude that there has been any change in hurricane activity outside natural variability. But there is also a wider point to be made: the endangerment finding in itself did nothing to boost technologies which might reduce the emission of the above gases – it was merely a boon for lawyers wanting to construct class actions against fossil fuel companies, car manufacturers and the rest.
The endangerment finding does not appear to have had any obvious impact on emissions. US carbon emissions have been falling all century. In fact, they were falling a little more sharply before the endangerment finding was issued than they did in the years afterwards: they decreased from 6.02 billion tons in 2000, to 5.49 billion tons in 2009, then to 4.90 billion tons in 2024.
One of the main reasons for this has been a switch from coal to gas power as successive administrations – Obama’s as well as Trump’s – have pursued a policy of exploiting shale gas in order to achieve national energy self-sufficiency. The fall in emissions, by the way, continued throughout Trump’s first term – the dramatic switch in policy, when he withdrew from the Paris Agreement, doesn’t seem to have had any great effect on US emissions.
As for China, green campaigners shouldn’t cheer too soon. The fall in Chinese emissions last year was of the order of 0.3 percent. And while China has been investing heavily in renewable energy (as well as continuing to pump money into fossil fuels), the main reason for the slight fall was a drop in emissions from cement manufacturing. This has rather less to do with government policy than with a slump in the construction industry. Nor is China’s slight fall in emissions unprecedented: emissions also fell slightly between 2014 and 2016 for similar economic reasons, before rebounding. So the narrative that China has finally turned the corner on emissions and that it will be downhill all the way from here is somewhat premature.
The real message to be taken from the US and China is that the big emitters – and most of the world, come to that – have no intention of following the example set by Britain and European countries and sacrificing economic growth in order to reach net zero targets. While they may dabble in policies which reduce emissions, they are not going to try to go the whole hog and eliminate net emissions altogether. Economic growth will remain their priority. The overall global picture is that emissions continue to grow, and that the only occasions on which they have fallen have been global recessions.
It isn’t America which is the outlier – Trump is merely more honest than most in putting economic growth over environmental concerns.
It is Britain and the EU who stand apart in sacrificing their industries to hit carbon targets. Of course, they are not really reducing emissions by anything like how much they claim to be doing – they tend to like counting only territorial emission, ignoring the emissions they have offshored to China and elsewhere.
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No, they haven't.
They sell a bunch of toxic crap to other countries but that is not exactly the same thing is it?
This is a country that makes fake trees because they can't figure out how to grow them.
“BBC’s climate editor”
No worries, the UK is about to taken over by the 3rd World fairly soon anyway.
When the scammers who should be in prison try to pull this climate change bullcrap, they never ever mention these gases in percentages where the demoninator is 100 because the levels are ridiculously low, they always mention parts per million (ppm) to make it sound more huge.
Take methane for example - They’ll say “Methane is 1.7 ppm of the atmosphere! Gasp! OMG 1.7!!! Meanwhile in percentages it’s 0.00017% If you drank a glass of water that contained 0.00017% cyanide, you wouldn’t even feel it that’s how low that amount is. Yet how many times have we heard a-holes with zero qualifications talk about how methane from livestock will burn up the earth? Self appointed atmospheric physicist Leonerdo DiCrapio mentions it all the time, this putz who travels the globe in private jets, yachts, limos while dining on filet mingnon
CO2’s ability to absorb long wave radiation is almost completely saturated at 100 ppm of CO2 in the atomosphere.
Plants die at 150 ppm and lower.
How low of a level do the envirowackos want to get CO2?
A disproportionate cost of clean air is being foisted on the US. To me, this is like posting a “No Peeing Zone” in a public swimming pool.
,,, the first rule of credible journalism is to not mention anything the BBC has to say.
Are you saying BBC= Bull💩, Bull💩, Constantly. I think you’re on to something Watson. 👌
This has been quite a cold winter in eastern regions and very warm in the west. I am starting to wonder if one of those billionaires got some deflecting particles up into the upper atmosphere somewhere — as a test run. If so, ease off cowboy, ease off.
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