Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, has promoted an uplifting vision for growth that is increasingly free from greenhouse gas pollution, but turning this plan into action is already proving to be controversial.
The big problem is coal.
Xi’s ambitions to save the climate are a cornerstone of a plan for the country’s post-pandemic rise that was endorsed by the legislature controlled by the Communist Party of China a few days ago.
The plan is designed to lead the country to two commitments made by Mr. Xi last year. China’s carbon dioxide emissions would peak before 2030, he said, and the country would achieve liquid carbon neutrality by 2060, meaning it would not emit more greenhouse gases than it removes from the atmosphere by methods like engineering or planting forests.
But an unusually heated debate has grown in China over how aggressively it should cut coal use, which has fueled its industrial take-off and still made it the most polluting nation in the world in recent decades.
Prominent Chinese climate scientists and political advisers want stricter emission limits, including virtually no new coal-fired power projects, and predict a boom in solar and wind generation. Powerful provinces, state-owned companies and industrial groups say that China still needs to use large amounts of coal for electricity and industry in the coming years.
“There is an absolute tension,” said Leon Clarke, a professor at the University of Maryland and co-author of a recent study on China’s options for reducing emissions. “On the one hand, there is a feeling that coal has boosted the economy and you don’t want to give that up. On the other hand, coal is the biggest target for climate action, especially in the short term. “
China’s environmental pressures were brought to life last week, when dense smoke hung over Beijing, reflecting an increase in industrial pollution.
The country’s annual carbon dioxide emissions are 28% of the global total, almost the same as the next three largest combined emitters: the United States, the European Union and India. The cumulative emissions from the United States and other wealthy economies throughout the industrial age, however, remain much higher than those in China.
Representatives of the coal industry present at the national legislative session in Beijing argued that China needs to continue burning coal, albeit in cleaner and more efficient plants.
The China National Coal Association published a report this month proposing modest increases in its use over the next five years, reaching 4.2 billion metric tons by 2025, and also said that China should create three to five “coal companies”. globally competitive world class “.
“The primary status of coal in our national energy system and its role as ballast will not change,” said the association in a previous document on the industry’s outlook over the next five years.
Provincial governments recently proposed more new coal mines and power plants, while promising that their projects will limit emissions. In response to the call for a carbon spike, Shanxi Province, one of China’s largest coal producing areas, has announced plans for 40 “green” and efficient coal mines.
Chinese authorities in these areas are also concerned about the loss of jobs and investments and the resulting social tensions. They argue that China still needs coal to provide a robust energy base to complement solar, wind and hydroelectric sources, which are more likely to fluctuate. And many energy companies that support these views are state giants that have easy access to political leaders.
“Local governments see coal energy as a robust energy shield,” said Lu Zhonglou, a Chinese businessman who sold his coal mines a few years ago and still keeps an eye on the industry, in a telephone interview. “You can’t drop the coal too soon.”
But supporters of China’s green transition, including government advisers, argue that the rapid abandonment of fossil fuels and the shift from traditional heavy industry will benefit growth, innovation, health and the environment. Some say China can increase wind and solar sources and reach a peak in carbon long before 2030, which would reduce costs and technological barriers to achieving carbon neutrality.
“A lot of hard work will be left until after 2030,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, who monitors Chinese climate and energy policies as chief analyst at the Helsinki Energy and Clean Air Research Center. “The central contradiction between expanding the chimney economy and promoting green growth appears to be unresolved.”
China’s new plan appears to give the different fields of the carbon debate a foothold. The plan promises green growth and the expansion of hydro, solar and wind energy, in addition to the construction of nuclear power plants. In 2025, the plan says, non-fossil fuel sources will supply one-fifth of China’s energy.
Still, the plan also seemed to excite coal advocates and disappoint environmental groups and climate policy experts. It did not include an absolute cap on annual carbon dioxide emissions and indicated that coal plants would continue to be built.
“Many areas still believe that before 2030 they can continue to substantially increase the use of fossil fuel,” said Wang Jinnan, president of the government’s Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning and a senior member of the national legislature, in an interview with a Chinese magazine published on the website of Academy. “This will have a major negative impact for China to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.”
Xi may face calls from abroad to offer more ways to reduce emissions, as China turns the plan into real policies. For China, action on climate change is also a way of building goodwill, including with the United States and the European Union.
The crucial questions are not just when China’s emissions will peak, but how high they will reach and how long it will take to drop dramatically.
An international pact to limit global warming in this century to less than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) and 1.5 degrees Celsius, if possible, is not possible without more urgent efforts by China and other major powers to reach carbon neutrality around the middle of the century.
“The longer the delay, the more difficult it is to reach the mid-century goals. It’s just math, ”said Kelly Sims Gallagher, a professor at the Fletcher School at Tufts University who studies China’s climate policies. China’s plan, she said, “will not have the effect of injecting a new impetus into global climate negotiations.”
Mr. Xi has a political interest in these issues. He promoted himself and China as guardians of an “ecological civilization” and made cleansing China’s air, water and soil a base of public appeal. When he announced China’s pledge last year to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, he also called for a “green recovery” from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Air pollution in China has decreased significantly in recent years. Mr. Xi created environmental inspection teams to put pressure on the authorities generally set on economic and political objectives. Inspectors showed their teeth earlier this year, when they made sharp criticisms of the National Energy Administration, which helps oversee plant approvals.
“Environmental protection has not been given the high priority it should have,” wrote the inspectors in their report on management. They criticized the government for allowing coal-fired power projects to continue in eastern China, where strict pollution limits are supposed to apply. In the past few days, environmental officials have also cracked down on steelmakers in Tangshan, a northern industrial city, which have been found breaking down pollution barriers, including sending false data.
But China’s post-Covid recovery is far from untouched. After emissions fell in the first months of last year, when the outbreak in China was worse, they increased again as spending on infrastructure and industry increased the economy, as well as the use of coal. China’s approvals for new coal plants have increased in the past two years, and more are on the way.
In the end, China’s greenhouse gas emissions increased 1.7 percent in 2020 compared to the previous year, the only major economy to show an increase that year, according to the Rhodium Group, an economic research firm.
To escape coal, China must face the costs of closing mines and plants, including the needs of millions of miners and other potentially displaced workers. Many coal-dependent regions and their workers seem unprepared for this possible change.
“I never thought about closing the coal mine, I never thought about leaving,” said Gui Lianjun, a 39-year-old miner in Shenmu, a coal town in northwest China, said by phone. He looked puzzled when asked about the link between coal and global warming.
“Has the government closed a mine because of global warming? I don’t think that’s possible, ”he said. “I never heard of that reason.”
Liu Yi contributed research.