China’s Coal Addiction
China is the world's biggest source of carbon dioxide, responsible for around 28% of global emissions.
In september 2020, President Xi Jinping announced that China would be aiming to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, which would lower the global warming projections by up to 0.3 degrees celsius.(1) The European Union and United States have been actively promoting renewable resources as an alternative to coal, so as to comply with the Paris climate agreement. Scientists believe that if the net carbon emissions of the contributing countries do not reach zero by 2050, we wouldn’t have a chance at precluding an intercontinental calamity.(2)
China has long been the world's largest coal user, having consumed more than the United States, the European Union, and Japan combined last year.(3) They primarily use it to produce electricity and rely on it for roughly 80% of their total energy.
Although China had planned to reduce their coal usage, they accounted for 85% of the world’s new coal plant proposals last year.(4) In addition to this, their latest five year plan was frowned upon by policy advisors and climate specialists. This proposal was supposed to show a lot of commitment, but it didn't measure up. China had announced that it would not set a new economic growth goal.
In the past, China has been known to adopt resource intensive methods of recovering from economic setbacks. If it plans on adopting a similar method today, their emissions growth could even accelerate after slowing down over the previous five years.(5)
Reports suggest that China's emissions will only continue to rise this year, by a minimum of 1.9%.(6) According to a study conducted by the Asia Society Policy Institute and Climate Analytics, To comply with the Paris Agreement, China must reduce its emissions as soon as possible, ideally by 2025. As we know it, China has only vowed to reach a reduction in emissions by 2030. (7)
On a slightly reassuring note, China has set its renewable energy goal to 20%, implying that at least 20% of their total energy must come from renewable sources such as hydropower and solar power. On the contrary, this still falls short of the long term goals set by them. Reports suggest that this threshold needs to be increased to a minimum of 25% in order to comply with the Paris climate agreement. It's important to keep in mind that China has exceeded the targets it set for each previous five-year plan.
The rest of the world is also making efforts to give the red light to coal, and the main reason for this would be that the leaders of countries in southeast asia have indicated that although they are in possession of coal reserves, they would be cutting back on the amount of coal plants they had planned.
