Overpopulation and the enviornmental impact of all this

Eoghan Barra · 09-12-2013 10:12pm

robp wrote: »

For example rampant deforestation for domestic cooking fuel can be reduced by stoves with improved efficiency or perhaps electrification.

Robp, don't you think that deforestation in Africa is often also driven by the desire for farmland though (as well as a variety of other factors)?

That seems to have largely been the case with in Rwanda, for example. Many would also say that the genocide that took place in that country was largely caused by land hunger in an extremely densely populated region, sparking ethnic cleansing as a way to take a neighbour's land.

AngryHippie · 09-12-2013 10:36pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

*yawn*

In most countries when people get richer and women are educated population growth slows right down.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population

From your own source:

Globally, the population growth rate has been steadily declining from its peak of 2.19% in 1963, but growth remains high in Latin America, the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa.

In 2006, the United Nations stated that the rate of population growth was visibly diminishing due to the ongoing global demographic transition. If this trend continues, the rate of growth may diminish to zero by 2050, concurrent with a world population plateau of 9.2 billion. However, this is only one of many estimates published by the UN; in 2009, UN population projections for 2050 ranged between around 8 billion and 10.5 billion.

I deliberately omit any statements by Jorgen Randers, as he is a member of the board of DOW chemicals, and as such has a massive conflict of interest in making any statement about population, or food supply.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

There is plenty of food for all. The only questions are can people afford it, and the problem of everyone wanting meat instead of staples.

False:
http://www.resilience.org/stories/2005-04-01/why-our-food-so-dependent-oil
Robert Newman - The History of Oil...

As for your above statement, The people who can least afford anything, also happen to be the least educated, who also happen to have the highest birthrates. Essentially what you are suggesting is that they will starve themselves back to a population equilibrium.

Nice.;)

djpbarry · 10-12-2013 11:01am

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

If they are struggling to feed themselves - is it responsible to go out and have a few children that you simply cannot support?

This is exactly the kind of ignorant, sweeping generalisation I’m talking about.

Who exactly is “they”?

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

I think it would be unfair for someone with 4 cars to say to a person living in a third world country ''right get off yer mophead'',your causing enviornmental damage..

Of course that would be the wrong approach,i completely get what you are saying,and wouldnt dream of being hypocritical like that.

But that’s exactly what you’re doing? You’re telling people in the developing world to stop having kids because you want to continue enjoying the same standard of living.

djpbarry · 10-12-2013 11:02am

Greensleeves wrote: »

I don't buy the thesis that as countries get richer/become more educated things will improve all of their own accord.

There’s a pretty strong inverse correlation between fertility rates and GDP.

Greensleeves wrote: »

And of course, just like us, they shop like lunatics. So they need landfill sites but as anyone that has been to India knows, the country is covered in litter because when there are 1 billion people it's not really possible to have proper waste management.

There are three quarters of a billion people in Europe, one of the most densely populated regions on Earth, but we seemed to have mastered waste management (sort of) – why can’t India?

Greensleeves wrote: »

I don't share the view that mobile phones are a sign of hope that all will be well with the world. More people in the world own mobile phones than have access to sanitation.

But telecommunications can help improve sanitation, among other things. Communication aids innovation.

Greensleeves wrote: »

We in the west have unsustainable carbon footprints.

Nail. Head. Those in the developing world aspiring to our lifestyle are not the problem. Our lifestyle is the problem.

djpbarry · 10-12-2013 11:03am

AngryHippie wrote: »

From your own source:

Globally, the population growth rate has been steadily declining from its peak of 2.19% in 1963, but growth remains high in Latin America, the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Nevertheless, fertility rates are in decline everywhere. In the early 80’s, fertility rates in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa were about 5 and 7 respectively – they’re now about 2.7 and 4.9 and dropping.

AngryHippie wrote: »

False:
http://www.resilience.org/stories/2005-04-01/why-our-food-so-dependent-oil
Robert Newman - The History of Oil...

What’s false exactly?

Birdnuts · 10-12-2013 11:19am

djpbarry wrote: »

But that’s exactly what you’re doing? You’re telling people in the developing world to stop having kids because you want to continue enjoying the same standard of living.

In alot of cases children are being born due to lack of familiy planning resources and womens rights. Refugee camps across Africa are full of large families who obviously cannot support these extra children

Birdnuts · 10-12-2013 11:24am

djpbarry wrote: »

Nevertheless, fertility rates are in decline everywhere. In the early 80’s, fertility rates in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa were about 5 and 7 respectively – they’re now about 2.7 and 4.9 and dropping.

They are still not dropping fast enough in countries like Uganda,Kenya,Egypt etc. that are already severly resource stretched in terms of pressure on land and water supplies. I've been to Kenya several times over the last few years and the landcape is shattered from deforestation and overgrazing. Only in a few National Parks do you see what Kenya used to look like - its quiet depressing actually:(

hotbabe1992 · 10-12-2013 7:17pm

Nail. Head. Those in the developing world aspiring to our lifestyle are not the problem. Our lifestyle is the problem.

You dont see that those who are aspiring to the same lifestyle that many first worlders have - is a problem too???

You must be blind.

But that’s exactly what you’re doing? You’re telling people in the developing world to stop having kids because you want to continue enjoying the same standard of living.

No thats not what im doing,nor have i advocated that,im saying that anywhere in the world where there is an overpopulation problem - it has to be looked at objectively if we are to save our actual enviornment that supplies us with precious resources that are needed for all to survive,if we continue to close our eyes and say overpopulation is not a problem it will peter out in ten years,then you clearly are delusional and/or have an agenda going.

djpbarry · 10-12-2013 8:40pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

You dont see that those who are aspiring to the same lifestyle that many first worlders have - is a problem too???

You know, back in 1973, when Ireland joined the EU, the Irish fertility rate was considerably higher than India's is now.

Aren't we lucky that our more prosperous European neighbours didn't view Ireland's aspirations to better itself as a "problem".

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

No thats not what im doing,nor have i advocated that,im saying that anywhere in the world where there is an overpopulation problem - it has to be looked at objectively if we are to save our actual enviornment that supplies us with precious resources that are needed for all to survive...

So overpopulation is not a global problem now, but is specific to particular regions? I'm guessing none of those regions happen to be in Europe?

AngryHippie · 10-12-2013 10:04pm

djpbarry wrote: »

What’s false exactly?

There is plenty of food for all.

At present population, there is just about enough

The only questions are can people afford it

At present, No, and the poverty gap is widening.

and the problem of everyone wanting meat instead of staples.

A problem that will never be solved in a free market economy.

Particularly when you expect industrialized farming systems to produce food cheap enough for the poorest people in the world. Economically its of more benefit to them to produce fodder for livestock.

As I was trying to point out, if there was a single policy for control of land resources and food production worldwide, then there may be enough resources to produce for food for 10 or 12 or maybe even 20 Billion people, but when 10% of the population have control of 90% of the capital, that will never happen. To suggest otherwise is naive.

Farmers will try and achieve maximum economic output from their land.

Whether that is fodder, staples or flowers, is dictated by effective demand.

Eoghan Barra · 10-12-2013 10:55pm

AngryHippie wrote: »

As I was trying to point out, if there was a single policy for control of land resources and food production worldwide, then there may be enough resources to produce for food for 10 or 12 or maybe even 20 Billion people...

The problem with this scenario is that it would require using even more of the planet's land surface for food production (currently about 40%), leaving little or nothing for the rest of the planet's inhabitants. Indeed at present we're heading in that direction pretty rapidly.

(That's not to say I don't agree with Angryhippie's post: I do.)

djpbarry · 11-12-2013 9:44am

AngryHippie wrote: »

A problem that will never be solved in a free market economy.

Removing/reducing CAP subsidies for beef production (for example) would have a pretty significant impact.

Eoghan Barra wrote: »

The problem with this scenario is that it would require using even more of the planet's land surface for food production (currently about 40%)...

I read it’s about 33%, but the vast majority of that is pasture.

hotbabe1992 · 11-12-2013 1:31pm

So overpopulation is not a global problem now

I do believe there is a lot of people in the uk i think in 2012 it was 63.3 million and thats not counting the people that didnt bother to fill out their census or were illegals in the uk,so thats not a true accurate figure.

There are more people in india though and to close your eyes to the population explosion there is a little ignorant..

I think we do have an overpopulation problem on the whole in a lot of countries across the world.

But we do have to look to the countries with the highest fertility rates,and the forests like brazil which are being destroyed at an alarming rate to not look at these things is stupid i think.

We have to look to these problems in order to tackle them and try to solve them,there is no point on saying to the people of ireland for example ''right sort your sh*t out'' and let every other country off the hook..It just to me doesn't make any sense..

djpbarry · 11-12-2013 2:26pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

But we do have to look to the countries with the highest fertility rates,and the forests like brazil which are being destroyed at an alarming rate to not look at these things is stupid i think.

Ok, so what's your solution to these problems?

hotbabe1992 · 11-12-2013 2:43pm

Do more to ensure they dont have more children,to make them see the ridiculousness of having more children in an enviornment where overfarming has given way to famine..Also educate them about the importance of the enviornment and how we are walking a tightrope right now.I suppose an obvious one,and one thats being done at the moment,but not compulsory is to make education compulsory that will ensure no child should go without an education.
Make it part of the law that children have to be educated othewise there will be penatlies.Like they do on our countries.

djpbarry · 11-12-2013 2:52pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Do more to ensure they dont have more children,to make them see the ridiculousness of having more children in an enviornment where overfarming has given way to famine.

Where are we talking about now? You were referring to Brazil a moment ago?

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Also educate them about the importance of the enviornment and how we are walking a tightrope right now.

You want to fly out to some developing country and tell them to stop damaging their environment? You're kidding, right?

Eoghan Barra · 11-12-2013 3:22pm

Originally posted by Eoghan Barra
The problem with this scenario is that it would require using even more of the planet's land surface for food production (currently about 40%)

djpbarry wrote: »

I read it’s about 33%, but the vast majority of that is pasture.

I had heard that it was around 40% in a talk given by conservationist Chris Packham:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po1Q4wTM9A8

Actually it's probably not an easy one to quantify precisely, as in reality almost the entire land surface of the planet is already used by people to one degree or another - even, for example, dense tropical forest (hunting/gathering/diffused forms of cultivation etc.). So at what point do you draw the line between 'wilderness' and land used primarily for production of food?

Sanderson and others have classified up to 83% of the global terrestrial biosphere as being under direct human influence, based on geographic proxies such as human population density, settlements, roads, agriculture and the like...

http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/153031/

In any event, those areas that are very clearly in agricultural use - regardless of whether it's in crop cultivation or pasture - are generally used pretty exclusively for our benefit. How much biodiversity, for example, will you find in an Irish pasture field of Italian rye grass, subjected to regular reseeding and chemicals in the form of fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, etc? Close to zero.

Much of the world's land surface is unsuitable for agriculture in any real sense (deserts, Antartica etc.). So probably a more meaningful way of understanding how much of the planet's capacity to 'grow stuff' we have appropriated for ourselves at the expense of other species is to think in terms of NPP - net primary production.

On land, one species, Homo sapiens, commands about 40% of the total terrestrial NPP. This has probably never occurred before in earth's history. Human "carrying capacity" on earth is hard to estimate, because it depends upon affluence of a population and the technology supporting that population. But at present levels of affluence and technology, a population 50 to 100% larger than we have today would push our use of terrestrial NPP to well over 50% of the available production, and the attending degradation of ecosystems on earth (e.g., air and water pollution) would be of major concern.

http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/globalchange2/current/lectures/food_supply/food.htm#intro

Increases in food production, per hectare of land, have not kept pace with increases in population, and the planet has virtually no more arable land or fresh water to spare. As a result, per-capita cropland has fallen by more than half since 1960, and per-capita production of grains, the basic food, has been falling worldwide for 20 years.

http://www.worldwatch.org/node/554

Capt'n Midnight · 11-12-2013 9:54pm

Depending on who you believe roughly 1/4 of the worlds food is lost through spoilage. So plenty of scope to feed more people without having to produce more.

most Kenyans don't have mopeds. You can get bicycle taxi's there, and that's not even an option if you are earning a euro a day.

not only do you have a carbon footprint but you probably have a human rights one too. We export waste to China where it's rubber stamped as recycled. e-waste is shipped to countries that haven't banned it yet. Foxconn have nets around their factories.

We hover up fish and displace tens of thousands of jobs and then sell the fish back extracting more money out of their economy.

12-12-2013 10:47pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Do more to ensure they dont have more children,to make them see the ridiculousness of having more children in an enviornment where overfarming has given way to famine..Also educate them about the importance of the enviornment and how we are walking a tightrope right now.I suppose an obvious one,and one thats being done at the moment,but not compulsory is to make education compulsory that will ensure no child should go without an education.
Make it part of the law that children have to be educated othewise there will be penatlies.Like they do on our countries.

That is incredibly idealistic when you look at the poverty a lot of these families live in. A lot of the time where primary education is free families cannot afford books and meals and transport to school, or often as these teachers as so badly paid there is huge teacher absenteeism in the free schools - quite often teachers don't show, and don't lose their jobs for it as no one wants to teach for the terrible wages. And education is often a luxury for these families when their children could be contributing to the family pot in numerous ways - farming, sorting rice, herding cattle, minding the younger children, working as child prostitutes, sorting rubbish or scrap to sell etc. It is not right, but it is the reality so making education compulsory does tnot solve that problem, and educating them about the environment when they live day to day to get enough to eat is unlikely to have an impact. In a lot of ways environmental concerns only enter people's perspectives after all basic needs are fulfilled.

hotbabe1992 · 12-12-2013 11:05pm

Put laws in place for these rubbish dumps and crackdown on prositution,rome wasnt built in a day,it is worth paving out a future for them no matter how hard and how many sacrifices have to be made to achieve this goal.

12-12-2013 11:20pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Put laws in place for these rubbish dumps and crackdown on prositution,rome wasnt built in a day,it is worth paving out a future for them no matter how hard and how many sacrifices have to be made to achieve this goal.

And how will the families feed themselves? Plus policing any of these crackdowns would be impossible, in Ireland we have far more police per head of population and we can't control prostitution

AngryHippie · 13-12-2013 5:32am

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Put laws in place for these rubbish dumps and crackdown on prositution,rome wasnt built in a day,it is worth paving out a future for them no matter how hard and how many sacrifices have to be made to achieve this goal.

India?
China ?
The USA ?

There is a book called One World by Peter Singer.
Read it. It should open your mind to some of the challenges that need to be overcome as a species before we can try to build a better future to the planet.
It should be compulsory reading for all. Just to highlight the challenges.

The complete lack of responsibility that comes with our current International governance systems is fairly indicative of how it will go until nationalism finally has had its day, and we can amalgamate and harmonize laws to transgress borders.

Unfortunately the human psyche is very insular and cannot cope without "belonging" to something greater, (teams, clubs, nations, races) and the concept of One World is actually beyond our comfort zone. As such the benefits of globalization are hamstrung and the drawbacks are all ours to wear. It will take generations. Generations we may not have......

Capt'n Midnight · 13-12-2013 11:02am

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

Put laws in place for these rubbish dumps and crackdown on prositution,rome wasnt built in a day,it is worth paving out a future for them no matter how hard and how many sacrifices have to be made to achieve this goal.

I think I see your true colours now.

You are teh benevolent dictator that will take on the white man's burden and force them to do the right thing.

You still haven't understood that you are demand sacrifices from those at the sharp end of the wedge. People on a €1 a day can't really cut back on moped usage, and even if they did it would take whole communities to offset just one SUV.

Faced with the prospect of breaking a environmental law imposed by a foreign government and not properly enforced most people wouldn't make the choice that leaves them hungry.

Target the big consumers first.

Remove the loopholes in off-shoring waste and hazardous work. When you have 15 year old girls dying in a factory because it shaves a couple of cent of the price of the latest Apple kit that has a gross profit of 50% it doesn't take a genius to figure out that the fat should be trimmed off corporate welfare and not on those who may have to break the law to eek out a living.

Generally in China , India and Africa and Brazil the big land grabs are by the rich and powerful. The locals have a vested interest in ruining their locality and if they can afford it won't. Lots of community projects have shown this.

All you need is a level playing field.

hotbabe1992 · 13-12-2013 12:30pm

You still haven't understood that you are demand sacrifices from those at the sharp end of the wedge. People on a €1 a day can't really cut back on moped usage,

Hang on where did i say i was telling them to get off their mopeheads,if anything what i said was that it would be unreasonable for me to tell them to get off their mopeheads while i had (lets just say) 4 cars..

I think I see your true colours now.

You are teh benevolent dictator that will take on the white man's burden and force them to do the right thing.

No nothing to do with me being white or anything like that,why are you making this into a race thing?

I dont think its biting off more than you can chew this could be enforced by local officials and police,if they see children prostituting themselves slap them in school,and have a word with the parents.If it is ascertained that the parents are pimping them well then penalties.

Faced with the prospect of breaking a environmental law imposed by a foreign government and not properly enforced most people wouldn't make the choice that leaves them hungry.

Target the big consumers first.

Remove the loopholes in off-shoring waste and hazardous work. When you have 15 year old girls dying in a factory because it shaves a couple of cent of the price of the latest Apple kit that has a gross profit of 50% it doesn't take a genius to figure out that the fat should be trimmed off corporate welfare and not on those who may have to break the law to eek out a living.

Generally in China , India and Africa and Brazil the big land grabs are by the rich and powerful. The locals have a vested interest in ruining their locality and if they can afford it won't. Lots of community projects have shown this.

All you need is a level playing field.

I get what you are saying about a level playing field,and think rightly like you corporate welfare needs to be targeted.
But why not have a scenario whereby if children are put in school the family gets food for a day,and each day they turn up they get food.

I know its somewhat of a welfare system ,but it could be used to kickstart education and when they are on their own two feet making the country a better place you can naturally take away the food for school intiative.

djpbarry · 13-12-2013 12:51pm

hotbabe1992 wrote: »

I dont think its biting off more than you can chew this could be enforced by local officials and police...

You just don't understand that the countries in question don't have the kind of resources that you're talking about. They don't have the manpower to enforce such things.

maninasia · 13-01-2014 5:13pm

LadyLabyrinth wrote: »

Hans Rosling is one of the eminent demographers in the world ... He is also interesting and presents things very clearly. I've seen him present a few times but take a look at this TEd talk... A lot of his talks revolve around how it's not overpopulation that will be a problem necessarily - it's the level of consumption/ increase in middle class level of consumption. http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth.html

They are related, and if you can solve one you may still be fecked with the other.

A bit like China, which on the one hand needs to build 100s of new coal power stations, and on the other hand is going mad putting in renewables but it's like a drop in the ocean.

djpbarry · 13-01-2014 5:31pm

maninasia wrote: »

A bit like China, which on the one hand needs to build 100s of new coal power stations, and on the other hand is going mad putting in renewables but it's like a drop in the ocean.

Not really - China's making a pretty dramatic shift away from coal and towards renewables and nuclear.

maninasia · 13-01-2014 5:32pm

Greensleeves wrote: »

I have spent a lot of time in the developing world I can tell you that China, India and much of SE Asia are very crowded places and that the lives of the millions of poor people are miserable beyond belief. It is the world's poorest people that suffer the most from having too many children. And in particular it is poor women who in some cases bear their first child in their teens and have had maybe 10 pregnancies by their mid-twenties.

I don't buy the thesis that as countries get richer/become more educated things will improve all of their own accord.

There has been a boom in Asia in the last decade - China, India, Vietnam, etc. - and as these countries got richer they went from bicycles to two-wheelers (mopeds, motorbikes) to cars. The rich buy Range Rovers, Landcruisers, Hummers, etc. and the rest buy whatever they can get their hands on. In India Ratan Tata helpfully made a cheap car to get the hundreds of millions of poor people on the road. The net result of this is that the roads of Asia are choked with traffic and all the attendant pollution. I don't begrudge these people their cars; why shouldn't they have everything we've got?, but that ditty about 9 million bicycles in Beijing would be more accurate if it said there were 9 million BMWs in Beijing.

The other thing people do as they get richer is travel; they start flying everywhere just like we do. In the last 10 or 15 years there has been huge growth in budget airlines in India, Thailand, China, etc. The Ryanair of Asia (AirAsia) is marvellously cheap and flys all over the region. But obviously planes are very bad on the CO2 emissions front.

And of course, just like us, they shop like lunatics. So they need landfill sites but as anyone that has been to India knows, the country is covered in litter because when there are 1 billion people it's not really possible to have proper waste management.

I don't share the view that mobile phones are a sign of hope that all will be well with the world. More people in the world own mobile phones than have access to sanitation. For the poorest people in the world this lack of sanitation condemns them to a life of misery and illness, and in India means that girls are more likely to quit education when they reach puberty because of the lack of toilets in schools.

We in the west have unsustainable carbon footprints. If by some act of magic the most populous part of the world was to wake up tomorrow morning and find itself with the same standard of living that we have there would be a bit of a problem. We are unwilling to make any meaningful changes to our lives; we'll buy a Prius, we'll continue to fly whenever and wherever we feel like it and we'll stump up for some carbon offsets, we'll toy with being vegetarian but conclude that the nice ethical/free-range/fairly-traded sausages from the nice organic chap at the farmers market are much better for the planet in the long run so really there is no need for us to change at all. And that is only the tiny minority that are even slightly bothered about sustainability and the environment. Most people don't care. And we delude ourselves that all this is fine and that if the whole 7 billion of us were all carrying on in the same fashion that would be fine too.

Well put, I have been based in Asia for many years and have experienced the serious pollution issues first hand, most especially air pollution which has been worsening across most of the region, not improving! This is actually the biggest problem we face in Asia at the moment if not the world, not climate change although that is a serious long-term issue. It gets ignored because air pollution is not a big problem in the US and Europe and yet it kills millions every year in developing regions and seriously blights quality of life.

It's very true, the huge and rapidly growing population puts very serious strains on the environment wherever we look, with animals and plants endangered in every region of the globe from over exploitation of resources for humans. Humans are a virus in some ways as are our associated animals including cows, sheep, cats and dogs. Just as one example, since I've arrived over a decade ago black tuna has almost gone extinct and local fish resources have been decimated, coastal regions are all fished out, the demand for fish has exploded, and squid and deep sea fish are now the go to food for many fishermen and fish farming now provides most fish served on people's plates (and that also has serious problems in terms of water table depletion on inland farms). People are starting to talk about eating jellyfish as they take over ecosystem niches vacated by fish.

The human population will level off eventually but at a number possibly at 10 billion, and with rapidly increasing expectations of lifestyles against resource depletion, the situation may be more precariously balanced than many realise.

There are good reasons to think that the Arab spring movement and regional instabilities are actually related to their exploding youth populations.

How much slack is there in the system? In terms of seriously reducing environmental impacts there are probably three things we can do

- stop having so many kids or have no kids
- stop or decrease eating meat
- ride public transport or bikes more and fly less

These are not that difficult in practice but it seems far too much for most people.

I'd say the problem is a global problem and not 'West' or 'East', it's a human problem. The Chinese have gone mad for automobiles, but only a few decades after the Americans went mad, and Ireland is also heavily dependent on cars. The Chinese are now the biggest CO2 polluters, but Americans are going mad for cheap shale gas and the Canadians are loving their tar sands. The West has cleaned it's air and water up but mainly be moving most of the factories to the East. It's shocking in a very real way to see this pollution which still exists, it didn't disappear, if just moved to a neighbourhood farther away, and is coming back to bite us all one way or another.

There is hope, the message is getting through in Asia Pacific more rapidly now, a realisation that this pollution is a very serious problem, but economic realities constantly push back i.e. oil/coal are cheaper options to keep inflation down and governments in power.

Capt'n Midnight · 13-01-2014 6:45pm

djpbarry wrote: »

Not really - China's making a pretty dramatic shift away from coal and towards renewables and nuclear.

Wind then solar then nuclear in terms of GW being installed.

http://cleantechnica.com/2013/02/21/china-reaches-50gw-of-connected-grid-wind-capacity-expected-to-top-140gw-2015/

China Reaches 50 GW Of Connected Grid Wind Capacity; Expected To Top 140 GW By 2015

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/11/asia-report-china-ascending-to-solar-pv-pinnacle

And China's not looking back. The National Energy Administration reportedly has increased its 2014 targets for solar PV capacity to 12 GW instead of 10 GW. Of that, up to 8 GW would be from decentralized solar PV. The State Council has said solar capacity should stay at the 10-GW/year pace through 2015, reaching 35 GW cumulatively installed by the end of 2015.

Germany reduced it's CO2 emissions by building more coal plants :eek:

They were replacing older plants with newer more efficient ones so they could get the same electricity from less coal. Those plants were started during the boom and while they still had nuclear. They didn't start any new ones since the recession. Since then it's been mostly renewables.

If you wanted to power the world with solar this is how much land you'd need

less land would be needed if we were more energy efficient (ie insulation) or we used more efficient panels.

Greensleeves · 13-01-2014 9:05pm

Things are not that rosy on the renewable energy front in China.

CNOOC to close new energy unit

Global Times | 2014-1-5

China's third-largest national oil company decided to end one of its renewable energy subsidiaries, according to media reports, as the country's lackluster new energy market continues to struggle with limited demand and high production costs, analysts said Sunday.

China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) plans to dissolve its subsidiary CNOOC New Energy Investment Co, a Beijing-based firm which mainly explores and produces several forms of renewable energy including wind power, coal-based clean energy and biomass energy, the Beijing-based Economic Observer newspaper reported Friday.

The newspaper cited an unnamed source close to the senior management of CNOOC who said that the company's top executives have lost confidence in the new energy company, which has incurred huge financial losses since its establishment in 2007.

Lin told the Global Times Sunday that the financial performances of China's renewable energy companies are highly dependent on the amount of subsidies from the central government.

"It is very costly for companies to develop clean energy businesses. Without the authorities' financial support, the price of electricity produced by renewable energy will be very expensive and consumers will not purchase it," Lin said.

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/835915.shtml

Overpopulation and the enviornmental impact of all this

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