Leve caída de emisiones en China: ¿inicio de un cambio? (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Welcome to the Global News Podcast on YouTube, where we go behind the headlines. Hello, I'm Oliver Conway, and today we're looking at some possible good news for the planet. Greenhouse gas emissions in China, the world's largest polluter, have fallen slightly. Our climate editor Justin Rolat is here. And Justin, how important could this be?

[00:00:22] Speaker 2: Well, looking at the figures, you'd say not very important, because how much of the first year ever China's emissions have actually fallen back? They've fallen back by 0.3%. Now, that really, really doesn't sound much. But what we're seeing it is against a background of level or falling emissions for almost two years now, for 21 months. In fact, they sort of peaked in kind of spring of 2024, and then have fallen back a bit more significantly since then. So what people are saying is, and look, it's couched around with caveats. It appears we might be seeing the beginning of certainly peaking of emissions in China, and possibly even the beginning of a decline in emissions in China. Set that in context, China is far and away the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, notably carbon dioxide, the biggest greenhouse gas. I mean, overwhelmingly, a third of all emissions come from China. So what happens in China, literally in this case, could change the weather for the rest of the world.

[00:01:23] Speaker 1: Yeah, you mentioned caveats. There is a margin of error on some of this. But take us through which sectors have contributed to it.

[00:01:30] Speaker 2: So what we're seeing is a fall in emissions in transport, power, cement. So huge sectors of the Chinese economy. Balanced against that, we're seeing an increase in emissions from the chemical industry. But overall, the net is a slight decrease. So that gives you a sense, I think, of how finely balanced this is. You know, most sectors in slow decline, one sector increasing quite significantly. So, you know, if one of those other sectors change direction, if, for example, there was a bit of a building boom in China, started using a lot more cement because use of cement has fallen back, you might see emissions push upwards again. So we're not saying, you know, definitively, China's reached the peak and it's going to decline. We're saying, oh, this looks like an interesting moment in the Chinese economy. Looks like an interesting moment for world emissions. Kind of let's see what happens.

[00:02:20] Speaker 1: Yeah, because it has a goal of reaching peak emissions by 2030. I was going to ask you if this progress could be reversed. You suggest yes. But is China broadly on track?

[00:02:32] Speaker 2: Broadly on track in terms of peaking, in terms of carbon efficiency, how much carbon dioxide is emitted per unit of production. It's actually way behind its ambitions and is struggling to meet the targets set in its 14th five-year plan. And then we're expecting it to struggle to meet the 15th five-year plan, having missed the 14th five-year plan. So it's behind on one measure. But in terms of total emissions, we're seeing this levelling potential peak, maybe even the beginning of a fall. So going in the right direction, what is behind...

[00:03:01] Speaker 1: Beginning to maybe go in the right direction. OK, beginning to maybe go in the right direction. What is behind China's push towards clean energy?

[00:03:09] Speaker 2: China a long time ago, 20 years ago or so, recognised a few things, one of which was that climate change was a really serious threat for China, that China's very water insecure, very big shortage of water. Climate change was going to affect agriculture, you know, everything in China. It was vulnerable to climate change. They needed to do something about that. China wanted to pioneer new industries. And it saw an opportunity in this kind of nascent, this emerging clean technology industry. So, for example, solar power. China sent out graduates to places that were in the developed world that were pioneering solar power and then brought the technology, brought that knowledge back and set up in the early 2000s, new companies to build solar panels. China has an amazing expertise at efficient manufacturing. And it brought that to bear on this challenge of producing clean technology and has delivered unbelievable results. And I say that without reservation, because the cost of solar panels, the cost of batteries, the cost of electric vehicles has fallen far quicker than anyone predicted. I mean, far quicker than anyone predicted. And that is a result of this huge investment in China. So they saw a market opportunity, not just for China, but they thought, look, look, climate change is going to mean that other countries are going to need to respond to this challenge. They thought, actually, this is a good export industry. And crucially, I mean, if you look back in history, all of the big technological developments happened in the West, predominantly in America, and then were dominated in terms of industrialisation by America. And China was looking for ways that it could find its own areas of expertise and found it in clean tech. And it depends, to go back to your question, on, frankly, a couple of decades of investment and really hard work.

[00:04:54] Speaker 1: And what does this slight fall that we've seen, what does it mean for global warming? And where are we at with world temperatures?

[00:05:02] Speaker 2: You've just got to look at the graphs of emissions. So, I mean, America was the biggest emitter until 2006. And since then, so now America produces 12, 13% of global carbon dioxide emissions. China is now about 32, 33%. So it's almost three times the emissions of America. That has happened. America's emissions have levelled off and fallen back a bit since then. But that's happened since 2006. So in 20 years, China's massively increased its emissions. So 80% of new carbon dioxide emissions come from China. So what happens in China, if China stops increasing emissions, that is a turnaround for the whole world. And then you've got to remember that the new technology we've talked about, all this clean tech and cheap new solar panels and all that kind of stuff, China, it's an export industry for China. China's selling that around the world. So it's not just China that's beginning to see this change in the structure of the electricity market, energy markets more generally. It's happening all over Asia, Africa, South America. Countries all over the world are buying this technology and changing the way that they generate power. So we're seeing the beginnings. We've got to be careful about this. You know, only 20% of energy used is electricity. So this is a fraction of total energy. But nevertheless, it's a really potentially the beginning of a really significant change in which the way the world uses energy.

[00:06:25] Speaker 1: Now you talked about all that investment from China. China pitching itself as the leader in the global transition to clean energy in stark contrast to the US.

[00:06:35] Speaker 2: So interesting. As China, these figures don't come from China. These come from outside analysts who are looking at it. We need to see them confirmed by Chinese institutions. But as we see this, what looks like a tipping point for Chinese emissions, we see the Americans, Trump saying he wants to lift federal restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions. He says we don't have to worry about the emissions from tailpipes, from cars and trucks. We don't have to in the future. I mean, the hope is his hope would be that we wouldn't have to worry about the emissions from power stations. He's saying, let's use American coal, use American oil to generate power and not worry about the emissions. So he's lifting this endangerment finding. It's called a technical term. It's an endangerment because the Environmental Protection Agency judged, based on scientific evidence, for which there's a huge consensus around the world, that the effects of climate change would have a material effect on the health of American citizens. So they said, therefore, we should have the power to regulate these emissions. He's saying we're lifting that. You don't have that power anymore. That's not going to happen in America. So America going on a very different direction. And lots of energy analysts are literally asking, as we speak, is how much difference will Trump trying to deregulate emissions control in America, how much difference will actually make if actually the cheapest energy in the world is solar power? Something really interesting just looking elsewhere in the world. Go to Saudi Arabia is one of the biggest investors in solar power, obviously also one of the biggest after America exporters of oil. But why are they investing in solar power if they've got these massive reserves of oil and gas? Well, they're doing it because actually the cheapest electricity in the world, particularly if you live in a desert, is from solar power. They're saying, well, let's put the solar power and we'll get our energy from there. And they're not saying we're not going to sell you oil and gas. They're saying we can make much more money selling oil and gas to the rest of the world than we can using it to drive power stations in Saudi Arabia. So you're seeing the change even in places where you really wouldn't expect it.

[00:08:35] Speaker 1: And in conclusion, looking at this small drop again, does this tiny drop, does it represent real change?

[00:08:42] Speaker 2: Look, people have been forecasting for a long time that China was reaching a peak. And actually, if you go back and look at the picture of American emissions, American emissions peaked back in 2007. So they're falling back. Most developed countries are seeing emissions fall back. So we see this trend as economies mature. They tend to reduce emissions. They're doing much less heavy manufacturing, much less building. So you do see this pattern. So people have been saying for a long time China's going to peak. But what's interesting about China is it's still doing that. Huge manufacturing. Still see this surge in demand for electricity and energy. And that seems to be being met by clean power. So yeah, let's wait and see. But it does look like an interesting moment for the world. Justin, thank you.

[00:09:21] Speaker 1: Justin Rowlats, the BBC Climate Editor. If you like this episode, please subscribe here on YouTube. If there's anything you'd like us to cover, leave a comment below. And for more international stories, download the Global News podcast wherever you get your BBC podcasts.