The article in Science Daily reported: “The researchers estimate that the oceans last year took up a record 2.3 billion tons of CO2 produced from burning of fossil fuels. But with overall emissions growing rapidly, the proportion of fossil-fuel emissions absorbed by the oceans since 2000 may have declined by as much as 10%.” This is the first time scientists have actually measured the change.

The study was pretty extensive. The article said it reconstructed the annual accumulation of industrial carbon from 1765 to 2008. As expected carbon uptake by the world’s oceans rose sharply trying to keep pace in the 50’s. By 2,000 carbon emissions reached “such a pitch that the ocean’s ability to absorb it declined even though the oceans absorb more each year in absolute tonnage. Today, the oceans hold about 150 billion tons of industrial carbon, the researchers estimate–a third more than in the mid-1990s.”

Of all the oceans, the Southern Ocean around Antarctica is most important. Carbon dioxide dissolves more readily in cold, dense seawater than in warmer waters. About 40 percent of carbon emissions enter the oceans through the Southern Ocean. As oceans warm up, and acidify, they become less capable of absorbing carbon dioxide.

Bottom line as stated by the study’s lead author, Samar Khatiwala: “Natural mechanisms cannot be depended upon to mitigate increasing human-produced emissions. “What our ocean study and other recent land studies suggest is that we cannot count on these sinks operating in the future as they have in the past, and keep on subsidizing our ever-growing appetite for fossil fuels.”

Amen, and add to that the world’s overtaxed and disappearing rainforests, and previously frozen Arctic carbon sinks.

Read the article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091118143211.htm.

While the U.S. is still talking industry friendly carbon offsets and emissions trading, a growing portion of the rest of the undeveloped world has something completely different in mind. In a nutshell, they resent us and blame the U.S. and other industrialized countries for the climate change problems they are ALREADY experiencing. Undeveloped countries will be presenting the concept of “climate debt” at the summit. They want “rich countries to pay reparations to poor countries for the climate crisis.” This is a radical departure from where the U.S. is right now. Heck, I’m still arguing with TEFLON COATED DENIERS that mankind is indeed producing too much pollution causing accelerated climate change. Deniers simply will not admit that maybe 7 billion people and their consumption habits like millions of food animals, and industrial pollution, plus deforestation due to population increase just might be over-polluting a closed environment no longer equipped to clean up effectively.

The article explained that the U.S. thinks of climate change as a “we” problem, but a growing number of countries view climate change as a problem created predominantly by the “few.” The coalition of Latin American and African governments stress big differences between who caused the crisis and those who suffer it the most right now.
The chief economist for the World Bank says the equation amounts to “75 to 80% of developing countries suffering the most even though they contribute collectively only about 1/3 of greenhouse gases.” The article further reported, “Developed countries, which represent less than 20 percent of the world’s population, have emitted almost 75 percent of all greenhouse-gas pollution that is now destabilizing the climate.” Yes science has a way of measuring pollution output now, where it came from, and what it costs in real money. This in and of itself should put a crimp in the deniers argument that mankind isn’t the culprit, it’s just nature. But…

So as the article stated, “Climate debt is about who will pick up the bill.” It went on to explain:

The grass-roots movement behind the proposal argues that all the costs associated with adapting to a more hostile ecology — everything from building stronger sea walls to switching to cleaner, more expensive technologies — are the responsibility of the countries that created the crisis. ‘What we need is not something we should be begging for but something that is owed to us, because we are dealing with a crisis not of our making,’ says Lidy Nacpil, one of the coordinators of Jubilee South, an international organization that has staged demonstrations to promote climate reparations. ‘Climate debt is not a matter of charity.’

The U.S. alone, which comprises barely five percent of the global population, contributes 25 percent of all carbon emissions. And while developing countries like China and India have also begun to spew large amounts of carbon dioxide, the reasoning goes, they are not equally responsible for the cost of the cleanup, because they have contributed only a small fraction of the 200 years of cumulative pollution that has caused the crisis.

Did you notice that China is considered a developing country? The U.S. tends to put China up there as a super power but truth is China still has more underdeveloped rural areas of population than not. And while they may still be building coal fired plants, they are emerging as a world leader in wind and solar, and are in the midst of building the largest smart grid in the world. We gripe about lost jobs in the U.S. The politics that keeps us from moving forward for renewable energy has cost us the jobs shipped to China to produce the parts for our largest wind farm in Texas. It wasn’t just about cheaper labor or materials in this instance. We simply didn’t have the labor in place, or the manufacturing facilities.

What should really make us sit up and take notice is that the idea of “climate debt” is “supported by the UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change — ratified by 192 countries, including the United States.” The framework not only asserts that “the largest share of historical and current global emissions of greenhouse gases has originated in developed countries,” it clearly states that actions taken to fix the problem should be made “on the basis of equity and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities.” Uh oh. They’ve got us in writing on this.

But Angelica Navarro, the chief climate negotiator for Bolivia, pushed the notion farther at U.N. climate negotiations in June in Bonn, Germany presenting the argument that not only are poorer countries already suffering the effects of climate change but in this new environmental arena they will not be able to enjoy the advantages of cheap fossil fuels in order to grow as the U.S. and other developed countries were able to do. They will bear a much higher cost burden to grow economically. But Navarro just didn’t point fingers. She presented a 3-point solution.Rich countries need to:

• Pay the costs associated with adapting to a changing climate
• Make deep cuts to their own emission levels “to make atmospheric space available” for the developing world
• Pay Third World countries to leapfrog over fossil fuels and go straight to cleaner alternatives.

Third World countries are tired of promises. They see what many of us see that the U.S. is going to stall on climate change along political lines. These countries cannot afford to wait around. And the list is growing with 49 countries taking their demands to Copenhagen in December with at least 240 environmental and development organizations calling for the same. Germany has recently acknowledged the concept of climate debt by paying Ecuador millions over a course of years to leave a huge cache of oil in the ground under Yasuni National Park part of the Amazonian rain forest. Other European countries are interested in following suit.

So we have developed countries already paying Third World countries not to produce more fossil fuel but to preserve environmental assets like forests. Meanwhile, some U.S. citizens and of course our massively wealthy fossil fuel industry look ill prepared to except not only the blame for much of the world’s pollution but even the concept that mankind has indeed caused environmental problems at all.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/30841581/climate_rage/3.

It’s my fault the tree had to go. I planted it on the berm to my canal and figured the roots would head that way eventually. Well, wrong. The roots headed under the pool. The tree grew so tall that the leaves floated into the pool too easily. The tree had to go although I considered shutting the pool down for good. That’s how much I cared for the tree.

I’m not alone in my feelings for live things I’ve grown. My husband was bummed too. When you raise something from a twig that is a straight 25 ft. tall beauty, it becomes part of your home’s landscape. This particular tree is or rather was a hybrid poplar—no floating cotton. I love poplar leaves. They blow in the wind all dangly like drop earrings. I took offense when the tree service referred to it as simply “an ole cottonwood” and quickly interjected that it was a hybrid poplar that I raised from a twig.

Well, it’s gone now. Besides missing it on the bank, I wondered just how much that one tree filtered the air. I’ve seen statistics but couldn’t remember. I also wondered if evergreens did a good job filtering since needles are a much smaller surface area than leaves where all the pollution control basically takes place. We just put in a nice, live, green, “noisy neighbor” fence of 5 Canadian Cypress (love the texture of this evergreen) and about 15 arborvitae. Maybe they collectively took the poplar’s place for pollution control.

I found some interesting things about all trees and their ability to filter pollution rummaging around for the evergreen vs. deciduous answer to my question. Someone else wanted to know the same and also if air pollution goes up in cold winter areas when deciduous trees are bare? I found some answers:

The Maryland Department of Natural Resources Forest Service describes how trees reduce air pollution as follows: Help to settle out, trap and hold particle pollutants (dust, ash, pollen and smoke) that can damage human lungs.

Trees remove gaseous pollutants like CO2 by absorbing them through the pores in the leaf surface. Particulates are trapped and filtered by leaves, stems and twigs, and washed to the ground by rainfall. At the same time trees replenish the atmosphere with oxygen.

They produce enough oxygen on each acre for 18 people every day.

And, absorb enough CO2 on each acre, over a year’s time, to equal the amount you produce when you drive your car 26,000 miles.

Although evergreen trees have needles rather than large “typical” leaves, they also fulfill the air pollution reduction that is described for other trees. In winter evergreen trees do photosynthesis, but to a lesser extent than in summer so they also contribute, to some degree, in reducing air pollution.

http://www.rtpi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12908.

I also found on americanforests.org that “Professor David Nowak of the USDA Forest Service conducted research in 50 US cities and developed a methodology to assess the air pollution removal capacity of urban forests with respect to pollutants.” This research is then used to determine how much city parks with trees do to clean the air using what is called “CITYgreen software—a desktop GIS program that calculates the value of trees to urban environments.” This program can estimate the amount of pollution deposited in a given area based on pollution data from the nearest city. Then it estimates how much is being removed based on the amount and coverage trees. The trees can then be assigned a dollar value relative to cleaning up pollution.
http://www.americanforests.org/graytogreen/air/.

I read that this dollar value is what is effectively driving areas of Africa to adopt a plan to stop the pillaging of land, forests, and especially animal life. It’s a shame to have to put a price tag on something in order to preserve it, but at this point I’m in—whatever works. Personally, I think land, forests, and creatures have inherent priceless value just because they exist for us. The beauty of these living ecosystems/creatures will be sorely missed in years to come. One third of all mammals are already on the path to extinction. Mankind is taking too much and not giving enough back. Balance is necessary, something Native Americans tried to tell us about from the get go. We either slaughtered or rounded up the Native Americans.

So we may not be getting it right yet, but there is some amazing work being done that constantly improves the data we have to determine how much we are actually polluting, how much is cleaned by forests/trees, and how pollution is affecting the general climate and for how long. Hopefully an informed public will move toward what is right for the earth more quickly than a neglectful public driven by climate change that gets horrendously worse.

New administrator declaring that global warming pollution “endangers” Americans’ health and well being
http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2009/04/epa-administrator-issues-proposed-ruling-on-global-warming/.

Being ordered by the courts to come up with mercury emission standards in two years.

http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2009/02/stricter-mercury-rules-on-the-way/.

Latest air study showed many U.S. cities flunking horribly
http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2009/04/us-cities-recent-air-quality-reports%e2%80%94not-good/.

Non-existence when it comes to enforcement of the clean water act.
http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2008/12/collapse-of-national-clean-water-act-enforcement-program/.

Plus, the largest and longest government report on the affects of global warming on the U.S. was completed and predicted bad consequences.
http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2009/07/predictions-from-completed-government-report-on-global-warming/.

Senator Voinovich (R) Ohio and Senator Inhofe (R) Oklahoma put their request for the EPA study in writing, and although Voinovich read this request, Inhofe refused to expound on what his party wanted but reiterated it was in writing and left. The reason for leaving is that there is an (EPW) Environment and Public Works rule that at least two members of the minority have to be present before opening a markup, but it is not necessarily binding.

The funny part came when I actually listened to Senator Voinovich request the EPA do this modeling first so that Republicans can be informed with the latest reports. No wonder Inhofe didn’t want to expound. Voinovich ended up complaining about the EPA that when it did modeling before it used assumptions that were unrealistic. He said the EPA’s modeling is only as good as the assumptions built into it. What? Why would one request the EPA to do all this unnecessary work when one wasn’t satisfied with the EPA’s methodology to begin with? Is this the same type of convoluted request as wanting to be included then not showing up?

I state that the Republican senator’s request is unnecessary work because of the government’s recently completed and extensive global warming study that puts many parts of our country in a precarious position. And this same committee heard 54 witnesses on nine panels relative to climate change just last week. So there is already a large amount of climate change data available for review. Senator Boxer also brought in EPA officials to answer any questions the Republican senators might have. But a lot of good any of this important and recent information is when Republicans aren’t there to hear it.

Stall or no stall, the U.S. going to be surprised at the biggest gathering on climate change to date in Copenhagen this Decemeber because the scheme of things has changed. Cap and trade isn’t going to cut it anymore. There is much more at stake as the rest of the world is focusing on reparations by wealthy nations for the damage done. Stay Tuned.

Watch part of the committee meeting:

Senator Voinovich’s Request for EPA study

The salt was accumulating too fast to be from diffusion and his group of researchers surmised the salt was there from thermal convection. Dr. Weisbrod explained that this process happens in arid and semi-arid environments like the SW U.S. or about 60-70% of land in the world. The atmosphere cools after sunset but air within a fracture in the earth remains warm as the rock that surrounds it. Cold air is denser and falls while the warm air rises. The cold air quickly replaces the warm and when the warm air within the hole, crevice, or fracture leaves it contains gases. It’s a thermal convection process and depending on the amount of microorganism activity within the fracture or hole, it aids the process of diffusion of gases from the earth’s crust. As Dr. Weisbrod stated: ‘Carbon dioxide is diffused through the Earth’s crust or the Earth-atmosphere interface through diffusion. [] It’s possible that greenhouse gases can be transported through thermal convection in areas where we have fractures, cracks, caves, or warm holes… the same physics works for every hole in the ground.’

All I can think of was Warren Buffet’s comment that drilling for more oil is a finite process and that we’ve already drilled thousands of holes in the earth already. He’s right. I’ve also done blogs on mining and know that in the U.S. alone there are estimates of over 500,000 mines. Add to that the process of extracting natural gas by blasting beneath the earth’s surface, as well as, forcing liquid CO2 left over from “clean coal” beneath the earth’s surface and we may have really tipped the scales on the amount of fractures, fissures, holes, etc. that exist to eventually leak gases into the atmosphere.

Read more about this new discovery: http://www.greenprophet.com/2009/06/23/9872/cracks-earth-global-warming-2/.

What’s up with this? The same satellite data from the UK Hadley Center used by SPPI for their July CO2 Report describes global temperatures falling fast since 2001,
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/originals/co2_report
_july_09.pdf, yet Dr. Pope of the UK Hadley Center clearly sees warming trends specifically tied to human produced green house gases. The Climate Progress article goes on to state that even “the traditionally staid and conservative International Energy Agency annual noted in its World Energy Outlook…’Without a change in policy, the world is on a path for a rise in global temperature of up to 6C.”

The same article blames poor messaging by scientists, environmentalists, progressives and bad media coverage for leading the public to think there is a broad range of global warming that could take place. In other words, it’s no biggy. I have to admit I’ve heard more than one TV personality make fun of the fact that we’re only heating up a degree or two over a hundred years. Unfortunately that degree or two conclusion depends on massive and quick CO2 reductions, which just aren’t happening. And so confusion persists in the U.S. aided by conservatives and energy companies. In the meantime, lack of acting quickly to reduce CO2 emissions leads to a more realistic scenario of a 5C or 6C rise in temperature over the next century.

Do we really understand what that means because 6 degrees Celsius is close to 50 degrees Fahrenheit? And more than likely that rise isn’t going to happen evenly in 10-year increments. That’s a lot of heat considering the west suffered temps in the 90’s and 100’s this past summer. At 150 F that area would surely become a desert wasteland by the end of the century.

Many of us are suddenly worried about debt in the U.S., and that we are leaving too much to our children. That’s not all we’re leaving them. If we don’t start cleaning up our acts, debt will be the least of their worries.

How friendly is it? The rallies are nothing more than the tangible power of polluting industries like coal and oil that are backing them and strangling the rest of America from moving forward with clean energy jobs, work on new infrastructure to deliver that clean energy, and economic turnaround, not to mention the health aspects of cleaner air and water for generations to come.

It’s ludicrous to call this movement “friendly” to America at all. Who releases invisible, and sometimes odorless, but nevertheless harmful pollutants into the air that also ends up in our water? Who dumps chemicals, drugs, and makes huge environmental mistakes like oil spills and coal slurry spills into our waterways? And did it ever occur to anyone that when we’re assured from the different polluting entities that the parts per million or PPM that is being released is well within the limits of what is healthful for humans that there are 100’s of other industries saying likewise? So the safe limits of PPM of mercury, ammonia, carcinogens from incinerators, and the thousands of supposedly controlled substances entering the air meet up with the PPM limits of mercury, lead, pharmaceutical compounds, big Ag runoff and the like found in our drinking water that meet up with the sometimes tainted food we eat full of additives like corn syrup solids that help along the Type II diabetes problem in the U.S.

The industries that do this to our air, water, and food protest global warming as way to sideline the real issue, which is their pollution, in order stop any policies that might make them clean up their mess, and to avert new green industry that is competition. It’s one of the greediest ploys ever and polluting industry is pulling out all the stops. They put saving jobs out front at these rallies to mask the bad they do to the environment and all of us including their employees in the long run. The rise in cancer rates and new diseases isn’t a coincidence but may be more of an indication of what we’re really eating, breathing, and drinking.

These anti-environmental rallies are called “grassroots” events but DeSmogBlog dubbed them “glorified company picnics.” A New Mexico blog FBIHOP reported: “The Houston Astroturf event [was] an ‘energy employee’s rally’ a more fitting description of the closed door event that drew somewhere between 2,500-3,500 oil industry employees who were bussed in and given yellow ‘Energy Citizen’ t-shirts in “‘another high-priced photo op for the oil and gas industry.’”

It was also stated that one of the rallies in Texas was organized by the DW Turner PR firm that represents BP and Chevron.

The biggest “Friends of America” rally slated for Labor Day in West Virginia is no different. It’s backed by none other than Massey Energy that is a notoriously dirty coal company. According to the Rural Blog, The Lexington Herald-Leader reported:

Massey Energy Co. will pay a record $20 million for polluting streams around its coal mines in Kentucky and West Virginia, and spend another $10 million to prevent future problems. The lawsuit filed by the Environmental Protection Agency last May charged that Massey discharged excess amounts of metals, sediment and acid mine drainage into hundreds of rivers and streams in the two states.

The Rural Blog also included Louisville’s The Courier-Journal statement:

The civil penalty [for Massey] is the largest ever for violating wastewater discharge permits, and “stems from the massive, 300-million-gallon slurry spill in Martin County, Ky., in October 2000, often described as the southeastern United States’ worst environmental disaster, as well as 4,500 violations of Clean Water Act permits at mines in the two states. Many of the violations exceeded limits by 40 percent, with some pollutants discharged at levels more than 10 times their limit, the government said.

So if you run across Massey’s CEO Don Blankenship’s invitation to the Labor Day rally on You Tube where he says: “Hello I’m Don Blankenship and I’d like to invite you to a Labor Day rally in West Virginia. We’re going to have Hank Williams and have a good time but we’re also going to learn how environmental extremists and corporate America are both trying to destroy your jobs,” beware of the devil who likes to confuse.

Massey IS corporate America at its polluting finest. These rallies support the real extremists.

BTW the rallies aren’t limited to a few states. Michigan has one slated for September 3rd, Detroit’s Burton Manor Banquet and Conference Center.

http://www.allbusiness.com/legal/trial-procedure-suits-claims/10272123-1.html
.

http://irjci.blogspot.com/2008/01/massey-paying-record-penalty-for-water.html.

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/verizon_massey/?rc=homepage.

Talk about going with the flow, and gaining a piece of the new pie in Japan. I also just blogged about Baoding, China turning their economy over to green technology in relatively short time and how that proved to be very lucrative. Chinese officials were pleased. It won’t be long until they are ahead of us on the green game too.

Meanwhile in the EU, European regulation for approval of hydrogen vehicles is now effective. We’re still haggling over fuel efficiency standards when Russia declared the era of cheap gas is over back in December. Putin stated: “The expenses for the development of gas fields rise sharply,” at a meeting of Natural Gas Exporting Countries in Moscow. “[]The era of cheap gas is over.”
http://dwv-info.org/e/news/mirror/2009/hm0902.html#Chinafördert.

So some of our biggest competition like Japan, China, and Russia know the bottom line. It’s time for change. Embrace it or get behind. Our U.S. automakers ignored the competition, and look what happened. We just don’t quite seem to grasp the urgency of the situation. It’s not just about climate change anymore. There is new green industry out there and it seems to be taking off in leaps and bounds elsewhere.

When we consider how much petro the U.S. uses, about ¼ of the world’s total, and that we only have 3% of the world’s oil reserves here, the math doesn’t add up to support the motto that we only have to get away from foreign oil by getting and using our own does it? So what’s the sense of going in that direction, when ultimately it will be a bust in the long run?

Who benefits from the argument against a cleaner earth, but the polluters?

Ground tests will take place at a GE facility first and then test flights will begin next year with a goal of approving a biofuel for use by 2013 not only for the jets but also the Navy’s ships.

The article also reported, “Boeing recently conducted a successful test flight of a 747 using a 50/50 blend of jatropha and jet fuel and saw significant fuel savings and emission reductions.”
http://green.yahoo.com/blog/ecogeek/1172/u-s-navy-testing-biofuels-in-fighter-jets.html.

Ecogeek.org gave details about that flight:

Air New Zealand recently released the scientific findings from the jatropha-fueled test flight they conducted in late December 2008. The flight resulted in a 60-65 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from the jatropha-jet fuel blend compared to traditional jet fuel flights.

The biofuel was responsible for a 1.2 percent savings in fuel over the 12-hour flight, which equaled 1.43 tonnes of fuel. Scientists also estimate that the decrease in fuel consumption saved around 4.5 tonnes of CO2 emissions. The biofuel used was a 50/50 blend of jatropha and Jet A1 fuel.
http://ecogeek.org/biofuels/2821-60-slash-in-emissions-during-jatropha-test-flight.

According to science.org.au: “Jatropha is a group of plants, shrubs and trees that can grow in dry, less productive land. Jatropha curcas seeds contain up to 40 per cent oil which can be used for biofuel. Because Jatropha grows on land of lower productivity, it is sometimes considered to be a biofuel that does not compete with food growing land and resources. However, commercially viable production of Jatropha can still use productive land, water and fertilisers. Jatropha curcas is considered a potential weed in Australia.”

Good, if commercial airliners switch to jatropha and petro biofuel maybe I won’t have to cover my pool and flip my stack chairs upside down. We figured out that all the pitting, and graying that happened to the plastic tables and chairs, and the stain in the bottom of the pool was from jet fuel. It started happening as flight patterns increased over our house. The stain we couldn’t scrub off finally went away when we covered the pool. We looked for the source. It wasn’t until I was floating in the pool looking up at all the criss crossed jet fuel plumes that the light bulb went on. Now I flip all the plastic stuff and it lasts just fine. The bad thing is that we’ve been breathing it.

According to the article: “With initial financing of $15 million and headquarters in both countries, the center will focus on coal and clean buildings and vehicles, said U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu. It highlights potential U.S.-Chinese cooperation in an industry that Washington says could create thousands of jobs.” It certainly garnered thousands of jobs for Baoding China.

Oddly, I happened to catch the Emmy nominated interview between Fareed Zakaria of CNN and China’s Premier Wen Jiabao on Sunday about the same time. Wen offered insight as to why China does not respond to the rest of the world’s assertion that they are a super power and should be more proactive and involved politically around the world. Wen said China is not a super power by any means. He said although China is moving fast with their economy and social reform, there are far more rural areas that are below par compared to China’s major cities.

And while we see China as communist, Wen seemed to describe China as more socialist/capitalist—think Hong Kong here. Fareed asked if Wen thought socialism could support a free market system? Wen explained there are visible workings of a free market and the invisible. The best scenario is a balanced free market through guidance and regulation by government. Wen sighted the book A Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith as an ideal. It is considered the first modern work of economics and Smith is considered to be the father of modern economics. A central belief of Smith is that labor is the measure of a nation’s wealth not it’s stores of gold and silver. Sound’s like China.

Both countries are hoping to avoid trade barriers by working together. The article stated: “China is promoting solar, wind and hydroelectric power to reduce reliance on imported oil and gas, which its communist leaders see as a strategic weakness. But Beijing has rejected binding emissions commitments, saying it is the responsibility of rich countries to cut their own output.” Again, they do not view themselves as a super power.

The whole time Wen was talking so candidly about the future, he made sense, and actually seemed charming. China will certainly be promoting a much greener economy since this interview took place before the breaking story about Baoding China’s resourceful turnaround from an auto and manufacturing center to a major supplier of solar and green tech products. This puts China is a position ahead of us already, super power or not. We’re still haggling over whether a turnaround away from polluting industry to a green driven economy will work, while China did it and knows that it not only works, but is also high profitable. It creates those better than gold jobs.

However, as smart and innocent as Wen appeared to be in the interview, and as I found myself agreeing with him on certain assertions about trade, and labor, the mantra going on in my mind was Tibet, Tibet, Tibet. Look what China did and continues to do to those innocent and wonderful people and the pristine land they maintained for centuries high in the Himalayas. China will surely pollute that area too. Fareed addressed Tibetan issues in this interview also and the answer was still pretty hard-line. On top of Tibet, what about China’s attempts to march on Taiwan as it has so many times before?

The interview is a good look at how China thinks. Fareed began the interview with Wen by asking how the Chinese feel about the state of the U.S. economy considering we owe China so much money. It was the million-dollar question over a possible default in payment if things don’t recover quickly here. Wen assured that China has confidence the U.S. will return to prosperity. It wants to help the U.S meet that goal. It looks as if this partnership for clean energy research might just be China’s way of pushing us to that prosperity—for China’s own sake. Make no mistake, China is out for number one always.

Watch some of the interview even though it is not about the environment per se, it is a good snapshot of China, a country we will soon partner with for clean energy research.