China and the US have outlined an eye-catching “common vision” to secure an ambitious global climate deal later this year, but experts say a centerpiece pledge by Beijing to establish a nationwide carbon market is no game-changer.
In a joint statement made during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) visit to the US, China confirmed it would launch a national cap-and-trade scheme in 2017, forcing big emitters to buy credits to meet carbon dioxide reduction targets.
The world’s top two greenhouse gas emitting nations also agreed to stand together during the crucial round of talks on a new global deal beginning in Paris in late November, agreeing that emissions targets should “ramp up over time in the direction of greater ambition.”
However, there were no specific new measures from either side to build on pledges made in November last year, when China said it would bring its spiraling emissions to a peak by “around 2030,” while the US promised to cut its own carbon dioxide emissions by 26 percent to 28 percent by 2025 compared to the 2005 level.
“I wouldn’t underestimate the importance of this kind of working together,” said Bret Harper, associate director of research at Australian clean energy consultant RepuTex.
“In terms of pure substance, there weren’t really any new announcements beyond some kind of fuzzy things regarding what China wants to do in the power sector and potential linking of carbon markets in the distant future,” he said.
The Nov. 30 to Dec. 11 Conference of the Parties (COP) in Paris will be the latest attempt by world leaders to forge a deal intended to avert more heatwaves, floods and rising seas following the failure of talks in Copenhagen in 2009.
China and the US have been the main forces preventing a global climate deal in the past decade or two. With the world’s two biggest economies now in agreement, a global deal in Paris has become much more likely, albeit with less ambitious targets than many, including the EU, want.
As a developing country committed to the notion that industrialized nations such as the US should bear most of the burden when it comes to combating global warming, China has been careful not to promise too much.
Emissions trading has already become an established part of its domestic policy agenda.
“The United States and China will actually stand together in the COP talks, and that has to be better than not standing together on whatever is agreed,” said Philip Andrews-Speed, head of energy security research at National University of Singapore.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary