[enviro-vlc] EXCLUSIVE-China report urges greenhouse gas peak in 2030

[Vern Weitzel]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/PEK286935.htm

EXCLUSIVE-China report urges greenhouse gas peak in 2030
17 Aug 2009 01:53:59 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Chris Buckley

BEIJING, Aug 17 (Reuters) - China should set firm targets to limit greenhouse 
gas emissions so they peak around 2030, a new study by some of the nation's top 
climate change policy advisers has proposed ahead of key talks on a new global 
warming pact.
The call for "quantified targets" to cap greenhouse gas pollution marks the most 
high-level public departure yet from China's official reluctance to specify a 
proposed peak.
"By 2008 China had become the world's biggest national emitter of greenhouse 
gases and faces unprecedented challenges," says the preface of the 900-page 
report, abandoning China's general reluctance to say it has passed the United 
States as the top emitter of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas from 
burning coal, gas and oil.
"As soon as possible, study and draft relative and (then) absolute targets to 
cap the total volume of carbon dioxide emissions," says the preface.
The "2050 China Energy and C02 Emissions Report" proposes that, with the right 
policies, emissions growth could slow from 2020 and with a peak in output around 
2030.
If China can achieve these goals, then by 2050 its carbon dioxide emissions from 
fossil fuel "could fall to the same emissions levels as in 2005 or even lower", 
the report says.
With its fast-rising emissions, China's stance is crucial in efforts to create a 
new pact to succeed the current Kyoto Protocol, which expires at the end of 2012.
Western nations have pressed Beijing to set specific goals on slowing emissions 
growth in coming years leading to early cuts in absolute volumes as part of a 
new pact that governments hope to seal in Copenhagen by the end of 2009.
(Reporting by Chris Buckley; Editing by Ken Wills)