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The United States has promised to halve its carbon emissions by the end of this decade, as President Joe Biden promised that the new targets would help create jobs and maintain U.S. competitiveness.
Canada, Japan and South Korea also made new climate commitments at Biden’s two-day virtual environmental summit, which involved 40 world leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, as the United States tried to convince more countries to reduce emissions.
Xi pledged to “progressively reduce” coal consumption in the five years from 2025, the first time the Chinese leader promised to reduce coal consumption.
However, at a press conference on the night of Beijing officials after Xi’s speech, it was noted that this would still allow China’s coal consumption to grow until 2026.
Su Wei, deputy secretary general of China’s state planner, said coal was still needed to ensure a stable electricity supply. “We need a stable source of electricity and we have no other options, so for a period we will need carbon power” to complement the unstable renewable energy sources, he said.
The U.S.-led summit on Earth Day, just three months after the U.S. it rejoined the Paris climate agreement, is an attempt to restore U.S. leadership on an issue that has been a central priority for the Biden administration.
“We are here at this summit to discuss how each of us, each country, can set higher climate ambitions that in turn will create well-paid jobs,” Biden told the leaders gathered. “We have no choice, we have to do it.”
Biden said the UN COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in November would be essential to addressing “the existential crisis of our time.”
The new US targets will reduce its annual carbon emissions by between 1.5 and 2.4 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2030 compared to its current trajectory, according to Climate Action Tracker calculations.
Annual global carbon emissions will be about 33 billion tons this year, according to the International Energy Agency.
South Korea has pledged to stop funding overseas coal projects, which had been requested by John Kerry, the U.S. climate envoy, during his visit there last weekend.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said his country would reduce emissions by 46% by the end of this decade, compared to 2013 levels.
However, Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg said the targets were “very insufficient” and full of cracks.
“Let’s call their shit,” Thunberg, 18, said a video posted on Twitter the same day of the Biden summit. “We are not so naive that we believe that nothing will be resolved by countries and companies that make vague distant goals.”
Global temperatures have risen by more than 1C since 1850 and the United Nations COP26 climate summit later this year will try to get the world to limit this warming to 1.5 ° C, the goal set by the Paris climate agreement.
So far, the promises made under the 2015 Paris agreement, which was approved by 197 nations, are far from what would be needed to achieve the 1.5C goal, including the new objectives announced at the summit.
The UK, which hosts COP26, urged other rich countries to give more money to climate finance, an issue that will be a key point of maintenance in Glasgow.
A successful summit would require “the richest nations to unite and overcome the commitment they already made for $ 100 billion [in annual climate finance]”Said Boris Johnson, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
Johnson, who provided a few moments of lightness at the summit, said the fight against climate change was not just a “rabbit hug” and that it was really an opportunity to create jobs.
The Prime Minister also unveiled the UK’s record for expanding its economy while reducing its emissions. “The cake, eat, eat, it’s my message to you,” he said.
Additional reports by Ed White and James Politi
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