More detail is needed of Hu Angang's climate change proposal

Comments on Peter Yuan Cai “Hu Angang and China’s climate change policy”, 18/03/2010, http://www.eastasiaforum.org/2010/03/18/hu-angang-and-chinas-climate-change-policy/

I have known Angang for a long time and he always command my respect.

He is a very versatile, productive and highly respected Chinese economist.

Having said that, I am not sure whether it is the representation of this article or his work itself, I am puzzled by what is shown in this article.

There is no way to know what HDI means and how it is calculated for each country and how the boundaries of different divisions are determined from this article. As a result, it is difficult to evaluate and comment on whether the proposal is fair or not, one of the two principles attributed to that proposal.

But it is probably possible to comment a little bit on the other principle that is efficiency.

I am not sure that said principle is met by such a proposal, given that it does not appear to be based on or equivalent to a market approach to equalise the marginal costs of emissions reduction, in a country, a region, or the whole world. At least the article even did not make it clear what is meant by efficiency, let alone how to realise that principle.

It would be more helpful if enough information is provided to enable and assist the readers to form a view.

From this article, we only read that "Hu Angang proposes an emission reduction scheme that is applicable internationally as well as domestically to China based on the principles of fairness and efficiency. He challenges the traditional dichotomy of developed countries versus developing countries in climate change debate with four new divisions based on the Human Development Index, HDI. He argues that major emitters including the United States and China should bear the brunt of responsibility for emission reduction."

But why should China be together with the US to bear the brunt of responsibility for emission reduction, given that on per capita basis, there are many countries that emit much higher emissions?

What is that rationale and is that sound?

Without enough details one is left only to wonder.