THE BIG PICTURE:
Obama was conned in 2015. The Paris Agreement was a ‘deal’ that put the West on the hook of emission reduction, while exempting China (and other ‘developing’ countries) from that obligation. China can carry on developing their economy, without having to worry about emissions reductions until 2030. It gets the world off their back, and a competitive advantage, for 10 years. Or more than 10 years -- dictators are not known for keeping promises!
China says they will "aim" to hit peak emissions before 2030 and for carbon neutrality by 2060, President Xi Jinping announced, speaking via video link to the UN General Assembly in New York. A possible translation from the Chinese: 'We will continue to increase emissions until 2030, but will then reduce them back to current levels by 2060.... ' If you read Marx, lying is permissible to get what you want. And I suppose the Wuhan virus did not come from China via Chinese people leaving China on airplanes ... even when travel to other cities within China was banned? The very worst thing you could do with a proven liars, like the Chinese Communists, is to believe anything they say.
DETAILS:
China is the world’s biggest source of carbon dioxide, responsible for around 28% of global emissions. With global climate negotiations stalled and this year’s conference of the parties (COP26) postponed until 2021, China’s president surprised the UN gathering by making a bold statement about his country’s plans for tackling emissions.
According to the official translation, Mr Xi went on to say: "We aim to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060."
Emissions from China continued to rise in 2018 and 2019 even as much of the world began to shift away from fossil fuels. COVID-19 made China's emissions fall by 25%, but by June 2020 they had bounced back again as coal-fired plants, cement and other heavy industries went back to work.
“Pledges” from dictatorships are worthless. And Xi won’t be around for ever. Xi’s"aim" contains no actual proposals or specific targets. He promises that emissions will peak before 2030, but his Paris Agreement was the same -- “(a) peak by 2030 at the latest”.
The term “climate neutrality” can mean that they will offset emissions by land use changes, planting more trees, etc. Such CO2 "offsets" are notoriously difficult to monitor and measure. Meanwhile, China is continuing to ramp up the use of coal for electricity. Their rebound from the COVID-19 decline is carbon-intensive and requires lots of energy from a system run mainly on fossil fuels. China has about half of the world’s coal power capacity and coal-fired power plants in development.
China’s would need to phase out coal before 2040 under 1.5˚C compatible pathways, but it appears to be going in the opposite direction. After lifting a previous construction ban on new coal plants in 2018, China has rolled back policies restricting new coal plant permitting in each of the last three years. By mid-2020 China had permitted more new coal plant capacity than in 2018 and 2019 combined, bringing its total coal capacity in the pipeline to 250 GW, and brought 10 GW of new plants online.
China is the world’s largest financier and builder of both fossil fuel and renewables infrastructure worldwide. Of all coal-fired plants under development outside of China, one quarter, or 102 GW of capacity, have involved funding from Chinese financial institutions and/or companies.
