China and the US, the biggest sources of the greenhouse gas emissions heating the planet, have stood in the way of an international climate treaty for almost as long as there have been efforts to craft one. The US never ratified the 1997 Kyoto Protocol partly because the pact didn't compel China and other developing economies to lower emissions.
Now, the two countries may be moving toward agreement on how to rein in the 40 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide pollution that comes from their cars, factories and power plants.
Chinese and US officials on July 28 pledged to cooperate on clean-energy technology. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lauded the memorandum of understanding for giving direction to ongoing negotiations between the two countries ahead of a meeting of 192 nations in December in Copenhagen that's supposed to produce a successor to the Kyoto pact.
"There is a good chance at the end of the day that we're going to be able to find an accommodation with China," says Todd Stern, the State Department's special envoy for climate change. Bilateral discussions are making progress, Stern says, while cautioning that there have been no "breakthroughs."
Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, says agreement between China and the US is make or break for the Copenhagen talks, which his organization is running. "If these two countries don't cooperate further, then we're not going to get a result," de Boer says. "They need to find a way forward together, and I think that they can."
No Carbon Caps
Developing nations such as China and India won't support a treaty that caps their greenhouse gas emissions, arguing that such limits might hobble the economic growth needed to lift more of their citizens out of poverty.
Instead, they'll probably agree to steps such as improving automobile fuel economy, raising the efficiency of power plants and installing wind turbines, says Elliot Diringer, who oversees international strategies at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change in Arlington, Virginia.
China is prepared to take such actions to get a deal, says Jonathan Pershing, Stern's lead negotiator. "We want them to be legally bound to those actions, and we want them to be very transparent so the rest of the world can see and evaluate the effectiveness of their policies," Pershing says.
De Boer says industrialized nations will be expected to commit to sharing technology and helping fund carbon cleanup in China, India and elsewhere to entice poorer nations to join the treaty. Developing countries by 2030 will need as much as $US67 billion a year in assistance from richer nations for greenhouse gas mitigation, according to UN estimates. China, India and South Africa said earlier this year that wealthier nations should commit at least $US200 billion a year.
China Overtakes US
Su Wei, China's lead climate treaty negotiator, says talks with the US have affirmed the principle of "differentiated responsibilities," a term that climate negotiators have adopted for the idea that commitments will vary from country to country based on economic development. "We're going to increase our dialogue and try to be as positive as possible towards a successful outcome in Copenhagen," Su says.
China overtook the US in 2006 as the biggest source of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels, when it pumped 6 billion metric tons of CO2 into the atmosphere compared with US emissions of 5.9 billion metric tons, according to US Energy Department data. The gap has widened since, based on estimates from the agency, which hasn't released final CO2 tallies for 2007 or 2008.
Greenhouse Gas Legacy
Still, the developed world is responsible for most of the excess carbon in the atmosphere today. The US accounted for more than 29 per cent of all global CO2 emissions from 1850 to 2005 compared with China's 8 per cent, World Resources Institute figures show. The US, with fewer people, has historical emissions per capita 15 times greater than China's.
"Industrialized countries have already polluted the environment, so it's unfair to ask China to accept the same standards as them," Li Yizhong, China's industry and information technology minister, said in a televised news conference in Beijing on August 13.
Indeed, China says developed economies should be willing to cut emissions by 2020 to a level 40 per cent below what they put into the atmosphere in 1990. While that may just be a negotiating stance, it's far beyond anything that U.S. lawmakers have shown a willingness to embrace.
Congressional Action
The bill that passed the House of Representatives in June calls for carbon dioxide cuts of 17 per cent from a higher base line of 2005 emission levels. The Senate hasn't passed anything yet. Lawmakers fear that China will gain unfair economic advantage from a global warming pact -- with cheaper power for its manufacturers, for example.
"There's going to have to be satisfaction within the US Congress that there will not be a significant shift of comparative advantage to key developing countries," says Robert Stavins, director of Harvard University's Environmental Economics program.
Ritt Bjerregaard, the mayor of Copenhagen, who was European Environment Commissioner when the Kyoto treaty was negotiated, says President Barack Obama and US lawmakers are showing a greater willingness to take the steps needed for an international treaty. "The industrialized countries need to show the way," she says. "But China too will need to embrace the opportunity."
The worst possible outcome in Copenhagen might be a repeat of the Kyoto Protocol, which was accepted by President Bill Clinton's negotiators and rejected by the Senate, which has to ratify treaties.
'Cautionary Tale'
Melinda Kimble, who led the US team in Kyoto in December 1997, says it was clear at the time that she wasn't getting what she required for Senate ratification. "Our warning to the Europeans that we really needed to have developing countries urgently as a piece of the package seemed to go unheeded," says Kimble, who's now a senior vice president at the United Nations Foundation. "Kyoto in some ways is a cautionary tale."
Getting China and the US on the same page before Copenhagen might help avoid a debacle. US negotiator Pershing describes the effort as a kind of dance: "They won't move if we don't move, and we won't move, probably, unless they move." His hope is that both sides will be ready to move at the same moment.