The meeting of Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping last week brought together the heads of the world\u2019s largest two economies and greenhouse gas emitting countries. The White House\u2019s initial reports from the summit described a \u201cpositive and productive\u201d meeting, although the US\u2019s bombing of Syria has overshadowed the details of their meeting in the media. Climate change, a major area of cooperation between the US and China in recent years, was sidelined in favor of issues around trade and national security. \u201c[Climate change] was not a major part of the discussion,\u201d according to Wilbur Ross, the US Commerce Secretary, \u201cnor do I recall the Chinese specifically raising it.\u201d The two countries\u2019 stances on climate change seemingly have flipped in the last few years, and, spurred by Trump\u2019s abandonment of the issue, the Chinese are now calling for, \u201cWestern opinion…to…pressure the Trump administration on climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n
President Trump recently\u00a0issued an executive order<\/a> directing federal administrators to begin dismantling his predecessor\u2019s climate policies. The order, which is essentially a memo from the President to his cabinet, instructs the US EPA<\/a> to rewrite Obama\u2019s Clean Power Plan, revise emissions standards for new coal plants, and undo regulations on methane emissions; to calculate a new Social Cost of Carbon; lift a moratorium on coal mining on federal lands; and to no longer consider climate change in other areas of national policymaking.<\/p>\n China, on the other hand, is searching for new partners in its global climate efforts, and President Xi has vigorously defended the Paris Agreement<\/a>, saying, in a thinly veiled warning to the Trump Administration, that the landmark climate agreement must not be \u201cderailed.\u201d Chinese officials have also used popular media to scold President Trump and remind the Republican Party\u2019s of the US’s historic leadership in climate change diplomacy.<\/p>\n The irony of this role reversal is not lost on journalists and political commentators. \u201cChina Poised to Take Lead on Climate After Trump\u2019s Move to Undo Policies,\u201d reported last week\u2019s New York Times<\/a>. And CNN asks<\/a>, \u201cCan China pick up US slack on climate change?\u201d According to the Chinese, the answer is \u201cno.\u201d Calling the Trump Administration\u2019s attitude \u201cselfish,\u201d a Chinese state-run newspaper declared last week, \u201cNo matter how hard Beijing tries it won\u2019t be able to take on all the responsibilities that Washington refuses to take.\u201d<\/p>\n These statements are, in part, political deflection from Beijing, as the government tries to dampen expectations and downplay its own agenda with characteristic humility. Yet China, hesitant\u00a0to accept the title of global leader on climate change, points to an important distinction that we need to make when discussing leadership: that of rhetorical leadership – leading from the pulpit and through diplomacy \u2013 and real leadership – leading by doing.<\/p>\n President Trump has entirely ceded the US\u2019s rhetorical climate leadership, which Obama had carefully cultivated in his two terms in office. Whereas the Obama administration worked with China and other countries to nurture a global movement to deal with climate change, the new government promises to abandon all multilateral diplomacy and fight to impede local climate efforts. The Trump administration is also endeavouring to abandon the US\u2019s actual leadership, and the recent executive order is the administration\u2019s first step towards cancelling meaningful climate policy.<\/p>\n The US, however, is like a massive ship with its own momentum and inertia, and its course will not be easily changed. The country\u2019s distinct form of federalism limits Presidential power on domestic issues to a greater extent than most people realise. While Trump begins to roll back Obama\u2019s vehicle fuel efficiency standards, California plows ahead with the country\u2019s toughest tailpipe emissions standards. And while there is no near-term hope for a federal cap on carbon, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a market-based program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, has expanded to nine northeastern states. Among the US’s\u00a0fifty states, thirty-seven have some sort of renewable energy or portfolio standard.<\/p>\n In addition to these political and legal realities, global economic trends provide tailwinds for clean energy in the US. The market ensures that President Trump\u2019s promise to revive the US\u00a0coal industry will go unfulfilled, despite the administration\u2019s efforts to tilt the playing field in coal\u2019s favor. Cheap natural gas will continue to eat coal\u2019s lunch, and wind and solar energy will expand as they become more affordable. Renewable energy production accounts for the vast majority of new jobs in the energy sector; in fact, solar power employs more people than the highly automated oil, coal, and gas industries combined. Trump can only try to hide these trends and slow their progress, but, as President Obama wrote in Science Magazine, no president can halt clean energy\u2019s steady march.<\/p>\n China is helping to drive renewable energy\u2019s global expansion<\/a>, taking the country\u2019s actual climate leadership beyond mere rhetoric. This year, the government will establish a national carbon trading market, which, with three to five billion tonnes of annual carbon allowances, will be the largest carbon market in the world. China also plans to invest US$361 billion in renewable energy by 2020, and its one-party system ensures that no shift in the political winds can prevent these outlays. These climate leadership benchmarks, however, belie the fact that China is a developing middle-income country with per capita income about one-seventh that of the US. \u201cChina will remain the world\u2019s biggest developing country for a long time,\u201d said a recent state-sponsored editorial. \u201cHow can it be expected to sacrifice its own development space for those developed western powerhouses?\u201d<\/p>\n There is a bit of coyness in this statement, yet there is also a kernel of truth. Despite China\u2019s massive investments in renewable energy, it is still investing<\/a> in coal – and exporting<\/a> it. Coal power capacity in China is expected to increase by 19% in the next five years, and renewable power production will account for only 15% of the nation\u2019s energy consumption by 2020. The government has plans to clean the air, yet China today has the deadliest air pollution of any country – one in five deaths attributed to noxious air.<\/p>\n Could China lead the world from the middle of the pack? The idea of leading from behind is antithetical to Chinese identity. \u201cTo be a leader in something,\u201d a prominent official recently told me in Beijing, \u201cyou have to be the best in that area.\u201d<\/p>\n This is China\u2019s dilemma: needing to sustain rapid development and simultaneously fill a climate leadership vacuum. The tension limits the country\u2019s ability to lead on climate. \u201cChina is not the kind of leader in terms of climate change that will pull other countries along,\u201d said Lauri Myllyvirta, a senior member of Greenpeace in Beijing.<\/p>\n In truth, no country or group of countries can fill the leadership void left by the US\u2019s retreat from climate change action. China will lead only in the areas where it can, but, as Myllyvirta says, \u201cChina won\u2019t strike out on its own.\u201d<\/p>\n Presidents Trump and Xi may not have discussed climate change at their meeting in Palm Beach, Florida. But as the oceans lap at the shores of both countries in an age of rising seas, subnational jurisdictions, non-government groups, and pioneering businesses push forward in pursuit of a better climate future. This decentralised leadership will have to suffice until a more forward thinking administration takes the helm of the most powerful country on earth.<\/p>\n Yaolin Zhang, a joint Yale-NUS and NUS Law Student, contributed research to this article,\u00a0which was\u00a0originally published by chinadialogue<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" China leads global renewables growth but can’t drag “western powerhouses” towards transition<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40000225,"featured_media":50025996,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[761],"tags":[513,580,13817],"hashtags":[],"country":[20000110,50040700],"class_list":["post-50008892","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climate","tag-carbon-emissions","tag-policy","tag-us-china","country-china","country-united-states-of-america"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n