China Won't Adopt Caps on Gas Emissions

AUDRA ANG Associated Press Writer

(AP) - BEIJING-China on Monday rejected international pressure to adopt mandatory caps on greenhouse gas production as it unveiled its first national program to help combat global warming.

The program offered few new concrete targets for reducing emissions in outlining steps that the Chinese government says it will take to meet a previously announced goal of improving overall energy efficiency in 2010 by 20 percent over 2005's level.

"Although we are not committed to quantified emissions reduction, it does not mean we do not want to shoulder our share of responsibilities," said Ma Kai, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, the Cabinet-level economic planning agency.

Ma said China is still a developing country and economic growth will continue to be a priority, but he said the government would remain aware of the problems of global warming.

"We must reconcile the need for development with the need for environmental protection," he told reporters. "In its course of modernization, China will not tread the traditional path of industrialization, featuring high consumption and high emissions. In fact, we want to blaze a new path to industrialization."

Given an economy that has been growing at better than 9 percent annually over the past 25 years, the plan's overall effect, if implemented, would be to slow the increase in greenhouse gases rather than reduce their absolute amount.

China has come under increasing pressure to take more forceful measures to curb releases of greenhouse gases. The country relies on coal - among the dirtiest of fuels - to provide two-thirds of its energy and is projected to surpass the U.S. as the world's leading emitter of greenhouse gases sometime in the next two years.

Henry Jacoby, a professor at MIT's Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, said the Chinese government is feeling pressure not only from the international community but also from domestic groups and even from the effects of global warming itself.

"China is very vulnerable to climate change," he said, noting it is heavily dependent on agriculture and is struggling with desertification in its western regions.

The new program was laid out in a 62-page report apparently designed to pre-empt criticism when Chinese President Hu Jintao attends an expanded summit of the Group of Eight industrialized nations Friday. The meeting in Heiligendamm, Germany, will feature a session on global warming.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, host of the summit, gave a cautious welcome to China's announcement, saying it was evidence "no one can escape" the issue. She added, however, that China eventually will have to say "something about clear targets."

Ma argued the bulk of responsibility for battling climate change lies with developed countries, which "are in a better position to cap emissions" after decades of unrestrained industrialization.

He said they have the obligation to provide financial and technical support to China and other developing nations whose "overriding priority at the moment is still economic development and poverty eradication."

China's plan calls for stepped-up efforts to put inefficient industries on a more sustainable footing and promises "to make significant achievements in controlling greenhouse gas emissions."

Measures include expanded research and deployment of energy-saving technologies, improvement of the agriculture system, increased planting of trees and improved water management.

John Reilly, associate director of MIT's Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, questioned the ability of the central government to implement the plan, since much of the reporting and monitoring happens at the local level.

Still, Reilly said China's engagement with the issue was progress. "The fact that they're responding to concerns in any way is a positive thing," he said.

Yang Ailun, climate and energy campaign manager of Greenpeace China, welcomed the plan's inclusion of such steps as reforestation and the use of renewable energy, but he also voiced skepticism about putting the proposals into practice.

"The problem right now is more how the Chinese government can implement these targets," Yang said.

Ma called President Bush's new initiative on global warming a "useful complement" to the United Nations' Kyoto Protocol but said it should not be a substitute for the treaty, which expires in 2012.

Bush proposed last week that the 15 biggest emitters of greenhouse gases hold meetings and set an emissions goal, but each country - including the U.S., China, India and the major European countries - would be able to decide individually how to implement it.

The 1997 Kyoto Protocol is an international treaty that caps the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted from power plants and factories in industrialized countries. It exempts developing countries like China and India, which is one of the reasons the U.S. and Australia refused to sign on.

Associated Press reporter Sarah DiLorenzo contributed to this report from New York.