Australians and Canadians worse polluters than Americans?
Posted by DavidM in Pollution | 9 February 2007
I came across a blog entry from the Adam Smith Institute which challenges the assumption that Americans are the worst global polluters.
I haven't checked their facts but the highlights are interesting. They challenge the criticism of the US - and unsurprisingly given the nature of the institute see those criticisms as more politically than environmentally motivated - with the following data.
Water pollution in the UK is 3-times that of the US, which ranks behind Denmark, Switzerland, France and Holland.
The US ranks 114th in the world (first being the worst) for urban sulphur dioxide concentration, "63rd in CFC consumption, 45th in urban NO2 concentration, and 13th in NOx emissions per unit of populated land area". The UK is, generally, much higher.
And finally, it seems the US isn't the worst for per capita greenhouse gas emissions. This dubious award goes to Australia with Canada in second place. New Zealand, the Czech Republic and Poland are also worse than America.
This is very enlightening and does suggest that Americans have been unfairly demonised while Australians and Canadians are more damaging. However the one statistic the review doesn't cover is total pollution.
The problem with the US is that it has high per capita emissions combined with a very large population. This makes it the nation with the highest overall emissions, and thus the biggest polluter in the world. There is also a suggestion in the entry's comments section that the author has missed data in the same reports that indicate the US is the worst per capit on some measures.
However, other nations shouldn't use this as an excuse to feel comfortable. I'm shocked that Australians and Canadians emit so much per head and it certanly doesn't sit well with the images those nations like to portray.
