Tempering the Warming Earth

By Deng Yaqing

Paris, usually an amiable metropolis due to its quiet and slow-paced cafes, is experiencing a hustling and bustling two-week period. Thousands of government leaders, negotiators, scholars and non-governmental representatives are gathering at the Paris United Nations climate change summit. Their goal: to finish sealing a fully articulated and legally binding agreement on curbing climate change after 2020. "By now, a total of 160 nations have submitted their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) on tackling climate change after 2020 to the secretariat of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and it's expected that other nations will follow suit," said Xie Zhenhua, Chinese special representative on climate change at a press conference on November 19. This reflects "that the world is making concerted efforts to address the increasingly grave global problem," said Xie. "Humans clearly influence the climate system, and recent anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases are the highest in history," the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in an assessment report released on November 2. "Each of the last three decades have been successively warmer on [the surface of the Earth] than any preceding decade since 1850. The period from 1983 to 2012 was likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1,400 years in the Northern Hemisphere," said the IPCC report. According to calculations by the UNFCCC, without an agreement in Paris, the global temperature will experience an increase of 4-5 degrees Celsius by 2100, which far exceeds the critical limit of rising no more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Reviewing the development history of the earth, one can find that the temperature difference between the pre-industrial world and the last ice age was a mere 4-7 degrees Celsius, which indicates that small changes in temperatures may mean big differences for Earth. As a matter of fact, the joint actions of the 146 countries that had submitted their INDCs by October 1 may lead the average global temperature to rise by around 2.7 degree Celsius by 2100, which means a failure in achieving the goal of rising below the 2 degree Celsius limit, according to a report released by the United Nations on October 30. Following that, at a ministerial meeting in Beijing, four large developing countries--India, China, Brazil and South Africa--agreed that the Paris summit should be based on the principles of the UNFCCC. In particular, they stressed the equality principle, common but differentiated responsibilities and the respective capabilities principles. Developing countries have already taken more active measures to cope with climate change than their developed counterparts. The developed world should further reinforce their emission reduction endeavors and ensure sustained and sufficient support in terms of financing, technology development and transfer. That is in addition to the capacity to support developing countries, especially the promised $100 billion a year by 2020 and intensified support after 2020, agreed on by the four countries. "Now, what underlies the success of the Paris summit is whether the common but differentiated responsibilities principle can be fully respected and whether the developed world will fulfill its promise to provide developing countries with financial and technological support. That is the foundation to establishing mutual political trust," Xie stressed.

China's endeavors

As the largest greenhouse gas emitter and the second largest economy, China shows a firm determination to carry out global climate governance by unveiling a series of joint announcements with the United States, France, India, European Union and Brazil and taking an initiative to submit its INDCs, said Li Peilin, Vice President of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. In early November, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his French counterpart Francois Hollande made a joint statement on climate change, pledging to promote a working program to speed up pre-2020 efforts in mitigation, adaptation and support during the Paris summit. Both agreed that any global treaty on climate change reached in the summit should include a mechanism to monitor progress on emission cuts every five years. Predating that, President Xi had also met his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama and outlined the new steps that the two countries will take to deliver on pledges made in 2014 to slash their greenhouse gas emissions. China will launch its national emission trading system in 2017, covering key industrial sectors such as iron and steel, power generation, chemicals and building materials. In addition, the nation will channel a total of 20 billion yuan ($3.13 billion) to set up the China South-South Climate Cooperation Fund to assist developing countries in the fight against climate change. Aside from that, the Chinese Government has been committed in carrying out industrial restructuring, advancing energy conservation and efficiency of energy use, optimizing energy structure and boosting the forest carbon sink. In 2014, carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP fell by 6.1 percent year-on-year and 15.8 percent compared to 2010, accomplishing 92.3 percent of the carbon intensity reduction goal set by the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-15). Energy consumption per unit of GDP fell by 4.8 percent, compared to 3.7 percent that registered in 2013. Efforts were made to eliminate 4,858-megawatt thermal power generation units, 31.1-million-ton backward steel production capacity, 87 million tons of cement production capacity and 37.6 million weights of plate glass cases and a total area of 83.24 million units were planted in a reforestation drive. Also, 135 million units of forests were raised and in the first half of 2015, a total of 54.37 million units were managed in reforestation initiative, and 63 million units of forests were cultivated, according to China's Policies and Actions for Addressing Climate Change (2015).

Pressing forward

In its INDCs submitted in June, China promises to achieve a peak in carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 2030, lower carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 60 percent from 65 percent, jack up the share of non-fossil fuels in the primary energy mix to roughly 20 percent and increase the volume of forest stock by roughly 4.5 billion cubic meters over the level in 2005. "China has also laid out adaptation measures, such as improving its early-stage alarming and forecasting system, adopting disaster reduction and prevention actions and promoting infrastructure construction for addressing climate change," said Xie, noting that more measures were included in a national climate change adaptation plan released earlier. Apparently, the pre-convention exchanges and communications of the Paris summit are more efficient and adequate than that of the Copenhagen summit, which will facilitate the process of wrapping up a legally binding treaty, said He Jiankun, Deputy Director of National Expert Committee on Climate Change. Countries draw up their own INDCs according to their respective development stage and national condition. This is more rational and viable than forcing countries to reach rigid, allocated targets, said He, suggesting that combating climate change is not a zero-sum game but a mutually beneficial action.