Chinese exports impact climate, say researchers

China's reported title as the world's largest greenhouse-gas emitter is due at least partly to the consumption of Chinese goods in the west, an international team of researchers has found.
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Christopher L Weber, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, in Pennsylvania, said that one-third of China’s greenhouse-gas emissions were due to the production of exports. "This proportion has risen quickly, from 12% in 1987 and only 21% in 2002," Science Daily quoted Weber as saying.

Weber and a team of scientists from Norway and the United Kingdom found that soaring exports and energy use caused Chinese emissions to rise to 6% of global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels.

Chinese exports rose 21% last quarter to a whopping US$666.6 billion in trade, the report said.

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