Abby L. Harvey
GHG Monitor
7/10/2015
China, the world’s top carbon emitter, last week pledged to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 60-65 percent from 2005 levels by 2030 in its Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. However, the commitments included in the INDC have been called into question by some skeptical of China’s resolve to meet these goals. “It just seems to be to be a rather convenient opportunity to celebrate a promise from someone or some country that hasn’t necessarily delivered on other promises before either,” Chuck McConnell, former Assistant Energy Secretary for Fossil Energy, told GHG Monitor last week. “Here in this case, we’re absolutely sure that this is the end all and be all for climate change commitment in the world because China said they’re prepared to do something out into the future and yet you can look at the last 20 years of all the things that they said they were going to do and we still find ourselves disappointed on so many other fronts on a regular basis.”
The INDCs are public commitments made by countries stating what they intend to do to combat the global issue of climate change. The UNFCCC had asked countries to submit these plans by the end of March — well ahead of the 21st Conference of the Parties to be held in Paris in December, at which time a new international climate agreement is hoped to be reached. “As a responsible developing country, China will stand for the common interests of all humanity and actively engage in international cooperation to build an equitable global climate governance regime that is cooperative and beneficial to all,” the document said.
While the INDC has been viewed by some as a significant step toward an agreement in Paris, the pledge in itself will do little to address climate in the absence of tangible action to develop the technology needed to reach these goals, McConnell said. “Promises are cheap, technology is what ensures transformation,” he said. “The hard work in deploying the technology and realizing the performance is the only way you’re going to ensure that we’re going to have meaningful impact environmentally.”
Motivation to Act
Without the development and deployment of transformative technological innovations with benefits not only in the area of climate change but also economically and from an energy security standpoint, China will have little motivation to carry out the promises made in their pledge, McConnell said. “Only then will we have the assurances that they’re likely to move forward because they will do it because it’s in their best self-interest, not because they promised or not because somebody told them to do it, but because they are able to realize something that’s actually going to make their lives better,” McConnell said.
The motivation to act on climate change is already present in China, Rebecca Lefton, Director of Policy and Research at Climate Advisers, told GHG Monitor this week. “China is doing this because they have national motivation to be doing this. There are national drivers for this in everything from the very serious pollution that is detrimental to the health of Chinese citizens as well as the opportunities that the major expansion of clean energy will drive [and] the economic opportunities that go along with that,” Lefton said. “This is really something that is being embraced at the highest levels of Chinese government because it’s something that is necessary for the expansion of China’s economic growth.”
The INDC also contains pledges that closely mirror commitments made in November 2014 during a joint announcement with the United States. In both the INDC and the joint announcement, the country pledges to peak carbon emissions around 2030 while making efforts to peak earlier and to increase the share of non-fossil fueled power generation in the country to approximately 20 percent. Within the INDC, China also commits to strengthening research, development and commercialization demonstration for low-carbon technologies, such as carbon capture utilization and storage. “A one-thousand-mile journey starts from the first step. To achieve the nationally determined action objectives on climate change by 2030, China needs, building on actions already taken, to make a sustained effort in further implementing enhanced policies and measures in areas such as regime building, production mode and consumption pattern, economic policy, science and technology innovation and international cooperation,” the document said.
