According to a study conducted by Harvard University specialists, it turns out pollution in China is lower than previously believed.
Zhu Liu led the study with a team of academics at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. The researchers investigated the problem of pollution in China and concluded that fossil-fuel emissions are actually lower than it was previously estimated.
According to this study, fossil-fuels emissions in China are believed to have been 14% lower in 2013 than what researchers believed. The team made the results public in Nature journal on Wednesday.
Given the fact that more than 190 countries wish to sign an agreement in Paris this year in December in order to limit emissions in the future and to prevent some of the worst effects of global warming, the results of this study should be taken into consideration.
The study suggests that the officials should pay attention to how they calculate the levels of emissions before deciding how much each country should reduce its emissions.
Even though China is believed to be the biggest emitter, the results suggest that the levels of CO2 that the country emits have been really overestimated in the past years. The team that conducted this study suggests that accuracy is a must when calculating the levels of emission gases in different countries. They hope for an improvement in this process in order to reduce uncertainty.
The study also led to interesting results regarding the coal and oil that China uses, as well as the cement production. It turns out that the levels of pollution caused by those factors are also lower than it was thought before.
80% of Chinese emissions are believed to be caused by the coal that China uses. The study proved that this coal contains 40% less carbon than it was estimated before when calculating the levels of greenhouse gasses.
For oils, the emissions factor was also lower than estimated, while for gas it was 13% higher. Moreover, the cement production industry actually generates 35% to 45% less greenhouse gasses than specialist previously estimated.
China became a greater polluter than the United States in 2006. It is believed that one quarter of the global gas pollution is due to the levels of gas emissions in this country. At the moment it is considered that the levels of greenhouse gas pollution are double in China compared to the United States.
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