China may overtake the United States as the world’s biggest source of greenhouse gases within months, one of the world’s leading energy analysts predicted on Tuesday.
Dr Fatih Birol, chief economist of the Paris-based International Energy Agency, said the country’s economic growth had been so fast in 2006 and 2007 that the historic global shift of climate-changing emissions from West to East, which was previously predicted for 2009 or 2010, could now happen by November.
But these predictions paled into insignificance, said Dr Birol, if China took no measures to restrain emissions. At current rates, he said, it would be emitting twice as much CO2 as the world’s 26 richest countries together within 25 years.
“[By then] CO2 emissions which come from China alone will be double the CO2 emissions which will come from all the OECD [Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development] countries put together — the whole United States, plus Canada, Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand” said Birol.
China has signed up to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, but, as a developing country, it does not have a cap on its emissions. The new prediction that it will become the world’s largest contributor of greenhouse gases this year will add to pressure for it to control emissions after 2012 when the treaty runs out.
“Without having China on board, no international climate-change policy has any chance of success at all. Without China playing a significant role, all the efforts of every other country will make little sense. It is terribly important.”
However, Birol accepted that on a per capita basis, people in rich countries still emit far more than individual people in China. US emissions in 2004, the most recent figures available, totalled 5Â 799-million tonnes of CO2 from 293-million people, compared with China’s 4Â 732-million tonnes of CO2 between 1Â 296-million people.
Historically, China has also contributed little to the present build-up of greenhouse-gas emissions in the atmosphere.
“By 2030 we calculate each individual in China will emit nearly seven tonnes of CO2 a year, but the average in OECD countries by then will be 13 tonnes,” said Birol
China’s breakneck industrial growth, which has been running at nearly 10% a year for four years and was reported to have increased unexpectedly to 11% in the first three months of 2007, has been fuelled almost entirely by burning coal.
The most populated country in the world has the world’s second-largest coal reserves, estimated to be over 185-billion tonnes, and 70% of all its greenhouse emissions can be traced to coal. This compares with 32% in the US.
Moreover, there is no sign that China is about to reduce its emissions.
Last year it built an average of five 300MW coal-powered electricity plants a week, and burned more than 1,2illionn tonnes of coal. Energy consumption in China is expected to continue rising fast as it aims to quadruple the size of its economy by 2020.
It is also massively increasing the amount of oil and other fossil fuels that it uses. Between 1996 and 2003, its oil imports increased from 20-million tonnes to 90-million tonnes. The number of cars on its roads has increased by at least 30% since 2002.
However, China has made serious attempts to stem the growth of its emissions. It demands far higher emission standards from its vehicles than the US, and plans to produce 16% of all its electricity from renewable sources by 2020, while reducing the energy intensity of its economy by a further 20%.
China improved its energy intensity by more than 60% between 1980 and 2004.
But while China’s leaders speak of their awareness of climate change and the need to address emissions, not enough is being done, say analysts.
A progressive renewable energy law came into force in 2006 but it has been implemented slowly. This week state officials are expected to say at a conference in Milan that only 80 wind farms have so far been built — far less than in Britain or Denmark.
China is well aware of the probable effects that climate change will have on the country.
According to a report published by its government on the weekend, change will mean larger deserts, more severe droughts and reduced water availability, as well as declining crops and increased spread of disease. The country is also vulnerable to sea level rises and the shrinking of glaciers, which provide much of its river water.
However, it is widely believed in economic circles that the country should focus on development first before cutting greenhouse-gas emissions.
China this week delayed publishing its long anticipated national “action plan” on climate change. It gave no reason. — Guardian Unlimited Â