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Originally Posted by Irace86.2.0
That’s true, but it is the best measure of how a society is doing that we have. It is far better than total emissions. But with total emissions, it provides us with the countries that will make the biggest impact.
Also, if you are going to compare differences then you should compare all the differences and not just living location. I believe the per capita values include all emissions from individuals and from industries, and from what I understand, China leads the world in manufacturing, and they are higher per capita than the US. Manufacturing tends to have a larger carbon footprint than other industries.
Even without that, the 20% difference can’t account for a greater than doubling per capita that the US has over China. Individually, we are high consumers with poor recycling.
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I think net emissions per land area might be a better (or at least interesting) way to look at the country-aligned figures. Consider that countries are defined by geographic borders, so each makes up a certain percentage of the planet in terms of area. Climate change is a planetary matter and not a population matter.
Also, the "net emissions" would have to account for how the country may reduce it's emissions, through undeveloped land area for example.