China answers emissions critics

BEIJING -- Developed countries are hypocritical for criticizing China's greenhouse-gas emissions while buying products from its manufacturers, a Chinese official said Thursday.

The country was seeking to defend its environmental record after a report said it had become the world's top carbon-dioxide emitter.

China overtook the United States in carbon-dioxide emissions by about 7.5 percent in 2006, according to the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency's report. While China was 2 percent behind the U.S. in such emissions in 2005, voracious coal consumption and increased cement production -- it makes 44 percent of the world's cement -- caused the numbers to rise rapidly, the agency said.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang called China the "world's factory" and said criticism of its increased emissions was unfair.

"The developed countries move a lot of manufacturing industry into China. A lot of the things you wear, you use, you eat are produced in China," he said at a news briefing. "On the one hand, you shall increase the production in China; on the other hand you criticize China on the emission-reduction issue."

Qin also stressed that while China's total emissions are increasing, they are less than one-quarter of those of the United States on a per-capita basis.

China, which has a population of 1.3 billion, spews about 10,500 pounds of carbon dioxide per person, while the United States releases nearly 42,500 pounds per person.

Academics and experts from the United Nations and the U.S. Energy Information Administration backed the report released Tuesday by the Netherlands agency, which is independent but paid by the Dutch government to advise it on environmental policy.

China uses coal for two-thirds of its energy. Half of U.S. electricity comes from coal.