China ratifies Paris agreement ahead of G20

The authors say coal is the main problem with the carbon intensity of the G20’s energy sector overall, because of the large number of planned new coal-fired power plants.

Opening his final trip to Asia, President Barack Obama is expected to join Chinese leader Xi Jinping in announcing their countries are formally taking part in a historic global climate deal.

He said the report outlines ways in which the electricity sector can significantly cut its emissions by 2050, but none that is in line with meeting the Paris agreement’s goal of keeping global warming below 2℃.

For Obama, ratification would be the culmination of a years-long diplomatic effort to win over China for a joint effort to fight climate change, and an opportunity to cement his legacy on the issue.

China and the US together produce 38 percent.

Between 1990 and 2013, the absolute carbon dioxide emissions of G20 countries, which account for three-fourths of global CO2 emissions, went up by 56 per cent, the report shows. Heal suggests a carbon tax and financial incentives for updates to the electric grid as ways to help the government cut emissions by 50 percent.

“It now looks like the Paris agreement will enter into force before the end of the year and that will really be light speed compared to nearly all other global agreements”, he said.

An agreement to cut emissions between the word’s two largest economies announced by Obama and Xi in China in 2014 paved the way for an worldwide deal almost 200 countries adopted in Paris in December of 2015. The accord provides for it to be implemented when countries producing 55 per cent of global emissions ratify it; China and the USA, the biggest emitters, together account for 38 per cent.

“For the major cities of our world, it is already clear that the faster we move to a low carbon economy, the greater will be the improvement in urban citizens’ standards of living, and the stronger and more sustained will be the economic development that makes that possible”.

China’s Xinhua news agency said that the National People’s Congress legislature voted to adopt “the proposal to review and ratify the Paris Agreement”.

Li Shuo, senior climate policy adviser for the environmental group Greenpeace, said Saturday that the two countries acting on the agreement was “a very important next step”. This would close the biggest loophole of the Paris Agreement, the distance between the national goals and the 1.5°C limit [to cap global warming at 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels].

“Accepting Australia’s current 2030 emissions-reduction targets rather than the action required to limit global warming to less than 2℃ means the report’s recommendations will not protect Australians from risky climate change”, said council member Will Steffen. Those targets aren’t legally binding, but countries must report on their progress and update their targets every five years.

Josh Frydenberg, the environment and energy minister, defended Australia’s climate policies on Thursday, telling ABC Radio the country had met its first commitments under the Kyoto Protocol “quite successfully” and was “on track to beat by 78 million tonnes” the 2020 target of cutting 2000-levels of pollution by 5 per cent. Only developed countries are expected to slash their emissions in absolute terms.

Both nations have set widely differing targets reflecting their different stages of economic development. If you would like to discuss another topic, look for a relevant article.