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China Could Deliver on Its Carbon Promise Earlier than Expected
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/532601/china-could-deliver-on-its-carbon-promise-earlier-than-expected/[font face=Serif][font size=5]China Could Deliver on Its Carbon Promise Earlier than Expected[/font]
[font size=4]China may put a stop to growing carbon dioxide emissions earlier than expected, but how quickly they start coming down is also important.[/font]
By Mike Orcutt on November 18, 2014
[font size=3]In an agreement announced last week, China and the United States, which together account for some 45 percent of the globe’s total carbon dioxide emissions, pledged to make significant efforts in the next 10 to 15 years to limit their CO2 emissions.
It’s the first time China has publicly committed to halting the decades-long rise of its CO2 emissions. However, due to economic factors and policy shifts, China may be poised to achieve this goal even earlier than promised.
The U.S. pledged that by 2025 the amount of CO2 it emits annually would drop to 26 to 28 percent below its emission levels from 2005. China meanwhile promised that its annual CO2 emissions, which have increased by 257 percent since 1990, would stop rising by 2030 or earlier. China also pledged that 20 percent of its energy would come from sources other than fossil-fuels by 2030. That’s up from around 8 percent in 2010.
As recently as 2010, when China’s economy was still growing at more than 10 percent a year, it was unclear when its emissions might peak, says Valerie Karplus, a professor of global economics at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, and director of the Tsinghua-MIT China Energy and Climate Project.
…[/font][/font]
[font size=4]China may put a stop to growing carbon dioxide emissions earlier than expected, but how quickly they start coming down is also important.[/font]
By Mike Orcutt on November 18, 2014
[font size=3]In an agreement announced last week, China and the United States, which together account for some 45 percent of the globe’s total carbon dioxide emissions, pledged to make significant efforts in the next 10 to 15 years to limit their CO2 emissions.
It’s the first time China has publicly committed to halting the decades-long rise of its CO2 emissions. However, due to economic factors and policy shifts, China may be poised to achieve this goal even earlier than promised.
The U.S. pledged that by 2025 the amount of CO2 it emits annually would drop to 26 to 28 percent below its emission levels from 2005. China meanwhile promised that its annual CO2 emissions, which have increased by 257 percent since 1990, would stop rising by 2030 or earlier. China also pledged that 20 percent of its energy would come from sources other than fossil-fuels by 2030. That’s up from around 8 percent in 2010.
As recently as 2010, when China’s economy was still growing at more than 10 percent a year, it was unclear when its emissions might peak, says Valerie Karplus, a professor of global economics at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, and director of the Tsinghua-MIT China Energy and Climate Project.
…[/font][/font]
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