When the U.S. and China announced their climate agreement Wednesday, I thought of Sen. John Warner. The former five-term Republican used to warn his colleagues that if America did not lead on climate change, China would “hide behind our skirts of inaction” and avoid making any emissions reductions.
Now that the two countries have set new goals to cut greenhouse-gas emissions, the argument that the U.S. can’t act because China won’t act has finally begun to fade. A very understandable anxiety—that America can’t cut carbon emissions while our biggest competitor keeps burning dirty energy with no end in sight—can now be put to rest.
China is already doing a great deal to boost clean energy, but went much further in this agreement. For the first time China pledged to slow and stop rising greenhouse-gas emissions by 2030 or earlier, while increasing non-fossil-fuel generation to at least one-fifth of its total energy mix. The U.S. committed to cutting its own emissions, by 2025, to 26%-to-28% below 2005 levels, up from a current 2020 target of 17% below 2005. Meeting these commitments will require both countries to double down on emissions reductions.
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