The environment: China takes the climate stage – by Adam Tooze

n January, sights were set on the next round of the United Nations climate conference, ‘COP26’, scheduled for Glasgow in November, just days after the elections in the United States. The strategy of the European Union was to broker a deal with China to raise its national commitment under the terms of the Paris Agreement of 2015. To get there, diplomatic attention focused on the EU-China summit billed for Leipzig in mid-September.

Xi has done big climate policy before. In November 2014 he appeared alongside the then US president, Barack Obama, to declare that China—despite its status as a developing country and although the climate problem was the historical responsibility of the west—would make commitments to curb its emissions from 2030. That declaration opened the door to the Paris Agreement.

Xi’s announcement means that, for the first time in the history of UN climate talks, the largest emitter is actually committed to radical action. For the EU, as for anyone who cares about the climate, this is good news. But it may also turn out to be disorientating.

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