, Columnist
China’s Growth Ambitions Will Erase the World’s Climate Gains
To become clean and sustainable, Beijing must match emissions goals to its GDP target.
China needs to try harder to curb emissions.
Photographer: Raul Ariano/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
The data on carbon emissions in 2023 is only just in, but we can already predict where things will go this year.
Global greenhouse pollution hit a new record and increased 1.1% last year, the International Energy Agency reported last week. That was almost entirely a China story. Had the country held its carbon budget steady — or reduced it, in the manner of fellow high-income countries whose pollution is now at a 50-year low — then the world’s climate footprint would have shrunk by about 155 million metric tons, instead of growing by 410 million tons.