Newly adopted climate mitigations have caused China’s coal and electricity consumption to fall the first time this century. Coal and heavy industries were the most targeted sectors, which has led to more demand from unconventional oil extraction – extraction that could have unintended negative consequences.

Increasingly, China’s local environmental groups are finding themselves well positioned to ensure governmental support for environmental improvement and accountability. The national government of China has signaled a green light for citizen groups to take an active part in forging a more sustainable development path, but local governments are still unsure of the role that civil society groups can and will play in improving China’s environment.

Chinese economists predict growth will slow from the current 7% to around 5% if China's carbon emissions are to peak in 2030. Qi Ye posits that climate commitment may constrain China’s economic growth rate, but not necessarily growth itself.

In 2013, the Sino-US relations ended with concern over strategic mistrust. In 2014, bilateral relations were characterized by a sense of optimism. While bilateral trust may endure through the Obama era, challenges will ensue thereafter.

The ambitious U.S-China climate proposal created new emissions standards for U.S. domestic power plants, which will reshape the power sector on a state-by-state basis. The 30% CO2 reduction target is significant and won’t come without domestic political opposition, despite the EU’s even more ambitious targets.

The commitments made at the Xi-Obama summit to reduce CO2 emissions are significant yet challenging for both nations to carry out over the next decade. The U.S. faces a more conservative Congress, and China faces the daunting task of creating to hydro and wind energy sources at a large enough scale. Both sides need to deliver, lest one side fault the other for not fulfilling their commitment.

China’s decision to ban coal-fired power plants in Beijing by 2020 marks a big advance in battling climate change. Stewart Taggard argues that this is the first step in a long march toward wider application of ‘energy by wire.’

The agreement between President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping of China to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is the most important advance in the several d

President Obama over the weekend made a bizarre decision to attack and damage his closest ally in Asia, and one of the most committed supporters of U.S. foreign

Since the failure of the 2009 climate summit in Copenhagen, both the United States and China have largely retreated from big international agreements, each wait