http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/21/business/energy-environment/china-to-place-limit-on-coal-use-in-2020.html 2014-11-20 12:11:08 China to Place Limit on Coal Use in 2020 The State Council, China’s cabinet, released details of an energy strategy that includes capping coal consumption at 4.2 billion tons. === BEIJING — China has said it would set a cap on coal consumption in 2020, an important step for the country to take in trying to achieve a recently announced goal of having carbon dioxide emissions peak around 2030. The State Council, China’s cabinet, released details of an energy strategy late Wednesday that includes capping coal consumption at 4.2 billion tons in 2020 and having coal be no more than 62 percent of the primary energy mix by that year. Coal burning for industrial use is the largest source worldwide of carbon dioxide emissions, which are the biggest catalyst of global The cap on coal use in 2020 is not necessarily a peak. In theory, coal consumption might increase beyond 2020, but some researchers say economic trends show the rate of growth in coal use slowing in coming years and peaking about 2020. That means the State Council’s timeline is consistent with the findings of those researchers. The numbers announced Wednesday might be further formalized in China’s next five-year plan, whose details will be released around March and which will guide national development from 2016 to 2020. Last week, President Obama and President Xi Jinping of China made an announcement together in Beijing in which each leader pledged to cut or limit carbon dioxide emissions from their countries. China said that it would reach an emissions peak “around 2030” and that energy from non-fossil fuel sources would make up 20 percent of the total mix by that year. That announcement, while consistent with China’s general economic direction and recent policy on energy use, was praised by environmental advocates as a significant political move by the two nations — it showed that climate change was high on the agenda of both leaders and that the United States and China would try to work together on the issue. Environmental advocates on Thursday welcomed the State Council’s announcement this week. But, as with the “around 2030” pledge on peaking emissions, they said China could make a greater effort — for example, China could cap coal consumption even earlier or at a lower level. “We think it’s definitely a positive sign, in line with what they’ve said they’re going to do,” said Alvin Lin, China climate and energy policy director in the Beijing office of the Natural Resources Defense Council, an advocacy group based in New York. But “it could be even lower,” he said. “We’d like to see it a bit lower than that, if you’re trying to meet the air pollution and air quality targets that they have set, and if you consider all the other environmental and health impacts of coal and the greenhouse gas emissions of coal.” Some Chinese officials began tackling the problem of coal burning with vigor in 2013, when the public outcry over toxic smog — Chinese cities are among the world’s most polluted — reached a high pitch. In September 2013, the government announced that provinces in populous parts of eastern China would try to cut coal consumption in the coming years. Analysts for Greenpeace East Asia said the amount of coal consumed in the first nine months of 2014 might actually have dropped by 1 to 2 percent compared with the same period last year, based on data from a national coal industry association. The miasmic air remains poisonous, though; the United States Embassy air monitor in Beijing labeled the air quality on Wednesday and Thursday “hazardous.” Last year, China consumed 3.61 billion tons of coal, and coal made up 66 percent of the primary energy mix. Li Shuo, a researcher at Greenpeace East Asia, said those figures indicate China should try to cap coal consumption by 2020 at a figure more ambitious than 4.2 billion tons, and have coal be notably less than 62 percent of the total energy mix. “What they laid out is a reference point, and then they will work from there to squeeze out more stuff,” he said. China’s recent announcements on coal consumption and the 2030 emissions peak could weaken arguments in the United States by opponents of President Obama’s climate change policy, who often ask why America should be acting if China is not committed to curbing its emissions, said Alex L. Wang, a law professor at the University of California at Los Angeles who studies Chinese environmental policy and regulations. “Opponents of climate change regulation in the U.S. have long used China’s emissions as an excuse for inaction on the U.S. side,” he said. “Last week’s joint announcement is the beginning of the end for this line of argument.” “The opposition is now shifting its critique, arguing that China has pledged to do nothing for 16 years,” he added. “Anyone familiar with China’s energy policy knows that this is simply not true. China’s energy targets — like capping coal and overall energy consumption and increasing non-fossil energy supplies — will require a tremendous amount of effort and their achievement is by no means assured.”