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by mrpopo 926 days ago
China doesn't take the world's plastic anymore, that comment is now 4 years outdated. Since then, some of it was shipped to south-east Asian countries but they started cutting back soon after.

That being said, plastic is a problem in itself, not a "carbon" concern as it is being discussed in COP28 so it is off-topic.

Regarding the "externalize manufacture"/"carbon hit", again, this is a little outdated. It was very true from 2005-2010, but since then China has developed rapidly and is now importing almost as much carbon as it is exporting. See graphs below for "consumption-based CO2 emissions vs. territorial emissions". Except for the EU, it is a matter of ~10% difference.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/production-vs-consumption...

1 comments

great graphic. if you zoom out over all time, the curves seem fairly similar