Essay by Eric Worrall
“… If industries resist, strict regulations may be required to enforce change or even force noncompliant companies to shut shop. …”
Time to fix responsibility for climate change
By Hu Yong | CHINA DAILY | Updated: 2026-01-26 06:43MA XUEJING/CHINA DAILY
Global warming is one of the biggest challenges faced by humanity today. As emissions continue to rise, global temperatures keep breaking records and the world’s poorest nations bear the brunt of a crisis they did little to create.
However, public discourse on climate responsibility remains mired in individualism. Citizens are told to recycle, go vegan and shrink their “carbon footprints” while systemic sources of emissions — from industrial production to state-backed fossil fuel subsidies — remain largely untouched. It is time the global conversation shifts from personal virtue to structural accountability, from lifestyle tweaks to large-scale political and economic reform.
…
Carbon emissions are linked to economic activity. Data show that 63 percent of emissions come from poor or developing countries, countries where the people are not rich, but are trying to achieve a middle-class lifestyle. In order to become middle or upper-class, lower income countries are forced to emit. Urging a developing country to cut back is an attempt to constrain its development, especially when today’s rich countries emitted freely on their way to prosperity.
…Politicians must understand that addressing climate change can be a decisive factor in their political success or failure. They need to tackle climate change substantively — not through symbolic actions like banning plastic straws, but by addressing the largest sources of emissions, such as coal and oil. Policy measures, including support to green technologies and investing heavily in innovations, would help. If industries resist, strict regulations may be required to enforce change or even force noncompliant companies to shut shop. With adequate funding, this strategy could disrupt the existing cycle and help lower prices.
Read more: https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202601/26/WS69769cb4a310d6866eb359f5.html
…
Developing countries like China get a free pass because they “are forced to emit”. But rich country politicians “must understand that addressing climate change can be a decisive factor in their political success or failure”.
The absurdity of this thinking is if CO2 was a problem, it wouldn’t matter whether the CO2 was emitted by rich countries or poor countries. It’s like Professor Hu Yong is demanding a free pass for developing countries to wreck the planet, while developed countries cut back to give them space. If the world truly had exhausted its carbon budget, everyone would have to cut back on emissions, developed or not.
Thankfully CO2 is not a problem. By every reasonable measure the global climate is improving, thanks to CO2 fertilisation. The world is becoming more benign for plant life, more able to sustain food production and create prosperity for Earth’s billions of people.
Even better, vast tracts of land which were too cold to farm are becoming arable, with far more to come if warming continues.
Global warming is no threat to survival. We should be emitting as much CO2 as possible, building a buffer against the ongoing Late Cenzoic Ice Age which still has the world in its grip, not panicking over every ounce of emitted CO2. Global cooling is what we should fear.
How do you say “how dare you” or “pay me” in mandarin?
Will Satsuma do?
There’s my new word de jour here on WUWT.
How do you say, “Go pound sand” in Mandarin?
Go pound sand
How Dare You in Mandarin
Call someone a turtle egg (王八蛋) wángbā dàn, and they’ll be ready to fight, especially if you’re a foreigner, “dabidze” (“big nose”).
(“big nose”). – wasn’t he a Jewish guy listening to someone talk about blessed are the cheese-makers?
Just curious as to the detailed rebuttal to Professor Hu Yong that has been offered by renowned Chinese Professor Sum Ting Wong.
The goal of climate alarmists has always been to destroy capitalism so that they could be the rich guys who were in charge.
A professor of journalism and communication always knows best.
When you know you’re doomed why do they even bother?
‘Doomsday clock’ scientists give terrifying update
I’m pretty sure his real name is Mi-Lee-Bent
If we shut down China that would be CO2 emissions sorted.
He should turn on the TV and watch the winter storms in the US and Canada which show that CO2 has no effect on weather and climate.
Oh no. You see, that is all Climate Change. And that is bad. Or is it weather?
Now I am confused.
-15C just on the other side of that great big pond from you guys. With lots of that white fluffy stuff from olden times.
well of course- the world should be subservient to our superiors in China
after all, it’s the Middle Kingdom with only barbarians outside it
Yeah, and China is not a “developing country” anymore, either.
It never was.
Yeah, and how did that Great Wall work out for them after all . . . you know, after some 2000 years of construction?
Hint: today, by far, the largest trading partner that China has is those “barbarians” in the USA at total annual exchange valued at about $580 billion USD (China exports to the US are about $440 billion per year versus China’s imports from the US are about $140 billion USD).
The best laid plans of mice and men . . .
Well, the Great Wall is now a very profitable tourist attraction! Sorry for the thousands of people who died building it.
Politicians must understand that addressing climate change can be a decisive factor in their political success or failure.
This used to be very true, but post consensus in the UK, you either continue to blindly believe in the fantasy – and can afford to – or you face the self-inflicted cost of living crisis and those skyrocketing energy bills. Bills that fund government grants to the already well-off to signal their climate virtue. And the message is clear:
Reform UK and the Conservatives want to wage war on clean energy, leaving Britain strapped to the fossil fuel rollercoaster, destroying the clean energy jobs we are creating and betraying our young people and future generations by giving up on tackling the climate crisis.
Labour is brave enough to face down the naysayers because clean power is the right choice for lower bills, energy security, good jobs and the climate. – Ed Miliband. The Guardian
Nobody dares mention the Falkland islands, I wonder why…
Falklands Oil Megaproject Breaks Free After 15 Years – Oil Price
Falkland Islands calls in North Sea ship to drill huge oil well
Sea Lion field is thought to hold 1.7 billion barrels – several times larger than the UK’s Rosebank – Daily Telegraph
Miliband is powerless
In what will be seen as a blow to the UK’s movement away from fossil fuels under the new Labour Government, the Falkland Islands seems intent on approving the development of a huge oilfield in its territorial waters.
The UK cannot stop the Falkland’s authorities from exploiting oil and gas reserves as the islands lie outside of the jurisdiction of UK ministers and effectively govern themselves. Offshore Technology
So much for the wild ride Putin rollercoaster mad Ed imagines.
“The UK cannot stop the Falkland’s authorities from exploiting oil and gas reserves…”
The horror of it- exploiting those wonderful, innocent resources! /s
Look on the bright side. Our illustrious PM Starmer is on his way to China, he will no doubt tell the CCP their political propaganda is not needed. He will tell Xi, just leave it all to me and Western industry will be closed down soon enough. With his fellow Marxist Ed Miliband in charge of shutting down the last vestiges of UKs manufacturing base, China can relax the hard pounding has been done..
No doubt he will also remind Xi what a great job he (Starmer) is doing supporting the communist/totalitarian cause. Banning elections, giving away UK security holdings in the Indian ocean to China’s good friends in Mauritius, locking up dissenters and blocking any internal challenge to his position as head of the UKs Labour Party.
He might also mention how helpful he has been in gifting the Chinese diplomats a nice new site for their Embassy on top of some of the most sensitive cables in London.
Communist China Has 75 Covert ‘Influence Outposts’ Across Britain: Report – Breitbart
They say Starmer’s trip to China was contingent on the embassy getting the green light.
I’ve frequently wondered what happens to Russia after Vlad passes, thinking it looks like a post-dictatorship civil war situation -probably I think that because I grew up in a USA culture that thought the Rocky 4 movie was good. I haven’t thought at all about where China ends up if its government falls. Instinct says different culture, different history, different reasons. Can anyone recommend a good book on it?
Russia will collapse again as the Soviet Union did in the ’90s. China is different. It’s much more cohesive. Read “On China” by Kissinger. It’s only about a thousand pages.
Thanks JZ I’ll Amazon Kissinger now. Your answer about China sounds like what I’m thinking too.
Another book I strongly recommend is, “The Hundred-Year Marathon”- subtitled, “China’s Secret Strategy To Replace America As the Global Superpower” by Michael Pillsbury. I’ve kept up with what’s going on in China- since the People’s Republic began on 10/1/1949, the day I came into existence. 🙂
Pillsbury is seen in a number of YouTube podcasts.
IMF GDP rankings:
”
1. United States
2 China
3 Germany
4 Japan
5 India
6 United Kingdom
”
plus AI:
“China is the world’s largest manufacturer, producing over 27% of global manufacturing output (approx. $4.6–$5.1 trillion in 2024), followed by the United States ($2.3–$2.9 trillion) and Japan ($0.8–$1 trillion). Germany, India, and South Korea round out the top industrial leaders.”
According to rankings of actual manufacturing, UK falls to about 10th behind the likes of Mexico and Italy.
It might be time to lean into whatever’s next.
TYRANNICAL Keir Starmer Parody Sketch – The Crewkerne Gazette
This is simply sophistry.
Pointing to someone else doing exactly what you are trying to hide for yourself.
China demanding everyone else shutdown hydrocarbons and coal as fuel while China itself is the planet’s single greatest emitter.
Look! Grasshoppers!
“Yes, Grasshopper. But can any man afford such arrogance?”
A lot,, a lot of arrogance is well funded, well paid.
Oh good lord, well let’s hope he burns up in one of those chinese electric buses…the best garbage disposal is still incineration
He too seems to be a victim of applied Noetic Science.
No victim, just a script reader.
” biggest challenges for humanity,
emissions rise,
temperatures breaking records,
the poorest,
crisis”
All from the international playbook, no matter which country they live in.
One should expect from highly educated to not sound the same, and have a bit of original thought,
but they all have been absorbed by the Borg.
One more step in China’s attempt to dominate the global economy.
Chinaman’s Polly want a cracker?
The guy is a journalism professor. So he, himself, has only what others have told him for the basis of his statements. And the “others” he talks to seem to be climatistas….probably good they’re not involved with voodoo, or the paranormal since this guy seems to cary more weight politically than his experience justifies.
“vast tracts of land which were too cold to farm are becoming arable”
I don’t recall ever hearing about this – can someone point me to a source?
“Even better, vast tracts of land which were too cold to farm are becoming arable, with far more to come if warming continues.”
Context is important. I distinctly remember when glaciers extended into the middle of North America to covering 1/3 of the (now) State of Iowa. The current northern agriculture line is about 850 miles north. Some might consider that as “vast.”
Source? See: https://iowageologicalsurvey.uiowa.edu/iowa-geology/landforms-iowa/des-moines-lobe
Look at any map of the northern hemisphere. Much of that land that is near the pole is too cold to farm now. Even a few tenths of a degree of warming moves the frost line north by several miles.
Claiming China is a “developing country” when it has the second largest economy in the world is just bullshit, plain and simple. How many countries have accomplished space travel? When it really gets down to it all countries need to be developing or get stranded in yesterday. The “China is exempt from emissions because it is a developing country” narrative needs to stop.
And the world’s largest navy- though of course it doesn’t compare in quality to America’s.
Translation: It seems Trump was right from early on about China’s intentions, as the long-running “climate” propaganda repeats itself here.
He is definitely asking a bit much even of
useful idiots.
Adapted with apologies to Abbott and Costello:
Professor who?
Yong.
I’m asking his name, not his age!
Hu.
The professor!
He is one Hu Yong.
Look, young or old, I don’t care. The professor’s name please!
Hu Yong.
I don’t know who’s young! What’s the name?!
No. Name Hu Yong.
I’M asking YOU to name the professor!
Professor Hu Yong.
OK, he’s young. So how do people say his name?
Hu.
THE PROFESSOR!!
And who’s on first base?
Correct!
Watts on second?
I don’t always seek life advice from professors of journalism, but when I do, I always check with the Chinese first.
I was trying to come up with something witty in response to this ridiculous article, but your post best sums it up for me.
That commercial will live forever.
They are going to bring him back.
I saw a new one last week.
Bad news China, this Chinese Professor is arguing against your continued industrialization.
Simple. We will follow China’s lead.
Chinese academic worried about everyone else’s CO2 emissions? This got my “first belly laugh of the morning” award.
“In order to become middle or upper-class, lower income countries are forced to emit.”
but… but… wind and solar energy is CHEAPER! /s
The professor hasn’t gotten the message – he addresses global warming which, as we know, is so last century – it’s climate change.
And Eric, please stop using the alarmist language. There is no such thing as a carbon budget. It may be a carbon dioxide budget.
Keep up the good work.