Researchers in the Netherlands report that it looks as if China has already overtaken the United States as the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases. (See also here.) Fossil fuel energy use has soared in China, where two new power plants — most of which burn coal — open each week. But this is not China’s fault, according to one British government official who told the BBC that China would not emit so much carbon dioxide were it not for Western consumers buying Chinese goods.