Lance Moore
GHG Monitor
7/17/2015
“Safety for its citizens and establishment of domestic energy security are the driving forces behind China’s shift toward low-carbon energy as it develops domestic energy and innovation technologies, while also seeking to carry out its submitted Intended Nationally Determine Contribution (INDC) to the upcoming climate negotiations in Paris”, said Paul Joffe, senior policy counsel for the World Resources Institute, at a panel discussion hosted by the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) this week. The panel focused on the recent U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, as well as current actions and future prospects for China’s shift to low-carbon energy, and was comprised of university, government, and business experts. China recently committed in its INDC to by 2030 reduce its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 60-65 percent from 2005 levels. The INDCs are public commitments made by countries to take certain steps to combat climate change. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change had asked countries to submit these plans by the end of March — well ahead of the 21st Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC to be held in Paris in December, which is hoped to result in a new international climate agreement.
China perceives its global climate initiatives and its pledge to partner with the United States carbon reduction as a major domestic policy investment. Dr. David Vance Wagner, China counsellor with the Office of the Special Envoy for Climate Change of the U.S. Department of State, said China’s participation in the premier mechanisms that underline the bilateral eco-partnerships, such as the 10-year framework for cooperation in energy and environment or the Climate Change Working Group (CCWG), is attributed to its desire to share best practices, innovate solutions, develop technologies, and improve compliance enforcement as a means to bolster China’s domestic policy interest as it moves toward becoming a more responsible clean energy power.
In adopting effective domestic policies that would achieve its INDC targets, China is promoting total coal consumption, “green” buildings, and increasing public transit, to name a few. However, the nation is also taking on huge risks in implementing these domestic policies as it faces heavy pressure from the working middle class and local governments to continue China’s stable economic growth while also addressing carbon pollution and effectively reducing emissions over the next thirty years. Dr. Wang Tao, resident scholar at the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center for Global Policy, addressed these risks by highlighting China’s need to stay competitive both domestically and within the international community while achieving its carbon intensity targets, “There is also a competitive consideration here, as China is really interested in building up its own industry capacities over time in order to become world leaders in new technologies with regards to renewable energies, carbon capture technologies, amongst other,” Tao said.
Dr. Joanna Lewis, associate professor of science, technology, and international affairs at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, echoed these sentiments. “China has taken these carbon intensity targets, not just to show the world that it is serious about climate change, but because they are actually within China’s domestic self-interest,” Lewis said. “China is looking to reform its economy from an energy intensive, heavy industry dominated economy (coal consumption) to more service based by moving towards developing high tech industries such as low carbon technologies, while decreasing reliance on foreign technologies.”
Keeping all of these factors in mind, China, as the world’s top carbon emitter, enunciated its commitment to holding itself accountable in making sure the upcoming 21st Conference of the Parties in Paris is a success in its intention to devise an ambitious global agreement to drastically reduce global carbon emissions by 2060.
According to a report released this week by the Center for Climate Energy and Solutions, the Paris COP is likely to result in a durable legal agreement with regards to global cooperation that sets binding commitments for all parties to holds countries accountable, and works to progressively strengthen global ambition. In creating a durable legal agreement at the COP in Paris, China and the global community will be able to reaffirm goals, reflect differentiation, establish transparency and adaptation, mobilize finance and investment, and recognize non-state actors, the report stated.
