By Elishya Perera
BEIJING (CU)_US President Joe Biden opened the global climate summit on Thursday (22 April) by announcing a more ambitious target for 2030, as his Chinese counterpart renewed Beijing’s commitment to become carbon neutral by 2060. According to President Biden, the US aims to slash its greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent of the 2005 level, by 2030.
“That’s where we’re headed as a nation, and that’s what we can do if we take action to build an economy that’s not only more prosperous but healthier, fair, and cleaner for the entire planet,” he said in the opening address of the two-day virtual summit. “These steps will set America’s economy to net-zero emissions by no later than 2050.”
In his speech, he also highlighted the importance of international cooperation, as he called on his fellow leaders to take action in their own countries, noting that no nation can solve this “existential crisis of our time”.
“All of us, particularly those who represent the world’s largest economies, we have to step up,” he said. “Science tells us that this is the decisive decade. This is the decade we must make decisions that will avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis.”
Meanwhile, Chinese President Xi Jinping welcomed United States’ return to multilateral climate governance, after former US President Donald Trump withdrew from international efforts. Beijing also renewed its commitment to become carbon neutral by 2060, a pledge which was first made during the UN General Assembly meeting last year.
“China will scale up its intended nationally determined contributions [to the Paris agreement] by adopting more vigorous policies and measures,” he said. These policies include curbing the increase in the consumption of coal over the next five years, particularly by imposing restrictions on coal-fired power generation projects. Meanwhile, the East Asian nation has already launched several other measures, such as the introduction of green finance, transport and infrastructure to its Belt and Road initiative.
The renewed commitments from Beijing and Washington was welcomed by the international community as the world’s top two economies together account for nearly half of the world’s total carbon emissions.
Although the US and China have been at each other’s throats over China’s treatment of Uighurs in the Xinjiang region, and its policies on Hong Kong, however, the two nations have agreed to join forces on the climate crisis. A few days ago, Beijing and Washington issued a statement pledging to cooperate with each other and with other nations over climate action.
