The Climate Change Minister, Greg Combet, says China is pursuing greenhouse gas emission reductions with “sincerity” despite the potential exclusion of the energy sector from the country’s pilot emissions trading schemes and a delay in their introduction.
Chinese officials are understood to have told a World Bank workshop in Shenzhen last month that the energy sector would not be included in the seven pilot schemes, prompting questions about their strength.
“I’m very mindful that there’s a large challenge to improve per-capita income and sustain economic growth but at the same time tackle the climate change issue,” Mr Combet said in Beijing yesterday after attending the Australia-China Climate Change Forum, where he met his Chinese counterpart, Xie Zhenhua.
“I don’t doubt the sincerity of the Chinese government in pursuing these emissions intensity reductions in the meantime.”
China, which has surpassed the United States as the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter in recent years, has been under increasing pressure to rein in emissions growth.
It had committed to establishing pilot emissions trading schemes from next year in five cities - Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Chongqing - and two provinces - Guangdong and Hubei - with a view to later developing a national carbon market. But Mr Combet said the delayed implementation of the pilot scheme in Beijing could push it out by a year longer than initially thought.
“They’ve indicated previously that they expect to do it in 2015,” Mr Combet said. “Given that the establishment of the pilot schemes may now be 2014, it could be 2016.”
Professor Han Wenke, director-general of China’s Energy Research Institute - part of the powerful National Development and Reform Council - said while energy was not included at this stage, it could be considered in future.
Dr Fuqiang Yang, senior adviser in Beijing for the Natural Resources Defence Council, said energy might be covered indirectly by the Beijing pilot because power consumers may be included in the scheme along with direct carbon emitters.
Details of China’s carbon trading pilot schemes are only now starting to emerge. Draft plans outlined this week suggest the Beijing pilot scheme will cover 600 companies, more than the 500 firms under Australia’s national carbon price.
In 2009, China pledged a 40 per cent to 45 per cent emission cut target from 2005 levels by 2020. It will also seek to meet 11.4 per cent of its primary energy needs from non-fossil fuel sources by 2015.
The Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, warned in his annual government work report last month that “targets for conserving energy, reducing emissions, and controlling prices are not being met”.
