Global momentum is building on the climate crisis, but major action is impossible without two nations, China and the US, which together account for more than half of emissions — and whose governments do not get along.
Ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow, experts believe that breakthrough US-China cooperation could be the catalyst for a historic agreement on climate change — but also that frosty ties between Washington and Beijing are not, so to speak, the end of the world.
Both nations have stepped up efforts to curb emissions, although analysts say that their actions are far too modest to meet a UN-backed goal of keeping the planet’s temperature rise to 1.5°C and avoiding the worst effects of climate change.
“If the national governments of China and the US are not able to agree on anything of substance, I think there may well be room for serious action anyway, because both countries are able and willing to do a lot on their own,” said Mary Nichols, who led major climate initiatives as chair of the California Air Resources Board and is now a fellow at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy.
“But that doesn’t mean that it’s irrelevant,” she said. “Without an explicit agreement, other countries will be reluctant to act.”
US President Joe Biden’s administration has described Beijing as his country’s top long-term challenge, and raised pressure on concerns from human rights to Taiwan and trade, but has sought engagement on climate.
“It is not a mystery that China and the US have many differences, but on climate, cooperation — it is the only way to break free from the world’s current mutual suicide pact,” US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry said in a speech recently.
Kerry has traveled twice to China despite a chill in relations, but on his latest visit, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) issued a warning.
“It is impossible for China-US climate cooperation to be elevated above the overall environment of China-US relations,” Wang said.
The remarks raised concern in Washington that the Biden-Kerry approach could backfire, allowing China to use climate as leverage.
However, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) soon afterward took a major step by telling the UN that Beijing would stop funding coal in its overseas infrastructure-building blitz, although it is still investing at home in the dirty, but politically sensitive form of energy.
Alex Wang (王立德), faculty co-director of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that China and the US could engage in a “race to the top” on who does more.
“It improves China’s global reputation to appear as a positive actor on climate,” Wang said.
“If the leaders in China feel like they are becoming laggards, I think it would lead to some pressure to act further.” he said.
Nichols, who helped design California’s cap-and-trade program that creates a market with incentives for reducing emissions, said one major step would be if China agreed to link efforts to set a common price on carbon.
“That would, I think, send an extraordinarily strong signal to investors and businesses around the world,” Nichols said.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS