Archive for ‘undermining’

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02/12/2019

China’s plans for new coal plants risk undermining battle against global warming

  • World’s largest coal consumer shows little sign of ending its dependency even though it is also the biggest market for renewable energy sources
  • UN climate summit is meeting to discuss ways to limit future warming, but hopes are fading that China will commit to further curbs on emissions
China now accounts for around 30 per cent of the world’s carbon emissions. Photo: AP
China now accounts for around 30 per cent of the world’s carbon emissions. Photo: AP
As world leaders gather in Spain to discuss how to slow the warming of the planet, the spotlight has fallen on China – the top emitter of greenhouse gases.
China burns about half the coal used globally each year. Between 2000 and 2018, its annual carbon emissions nearly tripled, and it now accounts for about 30 per cent of the world’s total.
Yet it is also the leading market for solar panels, wind turbines and electric vehicles, and it manufactures about two-thirds of solar cells installed worldwide.
“We are witnessing many contradictions in China’s energy development,” said Kevin Tu, a Beijing-based fellow with the Centre on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University. “It’s the largest coal market and the largest clean energy market in the world.”
That apparent paradox is possible because of the sheer scale of China’s energy demands.
Pollution alarm as tourism businesses contaminate home of China’s hairy crab
But as China’s economy slows to the lowest level in a quarter century – around 6 per cent growth, according to government statistics – policymakers are doubling down on support for coal and other heavy industries, the traditional backbones of China’s energy system and economy. At the same time, the country is reducing subsidies for renewable energy.

At the annual United Nations climate summit, this year in Madrid, government representatives will put the finishing touches on implementing the 2015 Paris Agreement, which set a goal to limit future warming to 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

Nations may decide for themselves how to achieve it.

China had previously committed to shifting its energy mix to 20 per cent renewables, including nuclear and hydroelectric energy.

Climate experts generally agree that the initial targets pledged in Paris will not be enough to reach the goal, and next year nations are required to articulate more ambitious targets.

Hopes that China would offer to do much more are fading.

Recent media reports and satellite images suggest that China is building or planning to complete new coal power plants with total capacity of 148 gigawatts – nearly equal to the entire coal-power capacity of the European Union within the next few years, according to an analysis by Global Energy Monitor, a San Francisco-based non-profit.

China is the world’s leading market for wind turbines and other renewables – but is still a major source of emissions. Photo: Chinatopix via AP
China is the world’s leading market for wind turbines and other renewables – but is still a major source of emissions. Photo: Chinatopix via AP
Meanwhile, investment in China’s renewable energy dropped almost 40 per cent in the first half of 2019 compared with the same period last year, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, a research organisation. The government slashed subsidies for solar energy.
Last week in Beijing, China’s vice-minister of ecology and environment told reporters that non-fossil-fuel sources already account for 14.3 per cent of the country’s energy mix. He did not indicate that China would embrace more stringent targets soon.
“We are still faced with challenges of developing our economy, improving people’s livelihood,” Zhao Yingmin said.
As a fast-growing economy, it was always inevitable that China’s energy demands would climb steeply. The only question was whether the country could power a sufficiently large portion of its economy with renewables to curb emissions growth.

Many observers took hope from a brief dip in China’s carbon emissions between 2014 and 2016. Today the country’s renewed focus on coal comes as a disappointment.

“Now there’s a sense that rather than being a leader, China is the one that is out of step,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air in Helsinki.

He notes that several developed countries – including Germany, South Korea and the United States – are rapidly reducing their reliance on coal power.

After climbing sharply for two decades, China’s emissions stalled around 2013 and then declined slightly in 2015 and 2016, according to Global Carbon Budget, which tracks emissions worldwide.

This dip came as Chinese leaders declared a “war on pollution” and suspended the construction of dozens of planned coal power plants, including some in Shanxi.

Pollution scandal near China nature reserve at Tengger desert’s edge

At the same time, the government required many existing coal operators to install new equipment in chimneys to remove sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxide and other hazardous substances. About 80 per cent of coal plants now have scrubbers, said Alvin Lin, Beijing-based China climate and energy policy director for the Natural Resources Defence Council, a non-profit.

As a result, the air quality in many Chinese cities, including Beijing, improved significantly between 2013 and 2017. Residents long accustomed to wearing face masks and running home air-filter machines enjoyed a reprieve of more “blue sky days,” as low-pollution days are known in China.

In the past three years, China’s carbon emissions have begun to rise again, according to Global Carbon Budget.

The coming winter in Beijing may see a return of prolonged smog, as authorities loosen environmental controls on heavy industry – in part to compensate for other slowing sectors in the economy.

The UN Climate Change Conference is taking place in Madrid this month. Photo: AFP
The UN Climate Change Conference is taking place in Madrid this month. Photo: AFP
Permits for new coal plants proliferated after regulatory authority was briefly devolved from Beijing to provincial governments, which see construction projects and coal operations as boosts to local economies and tax bases, said Ted Nace, executive director of Global Energy Monitor.
“It’s as though a boa constrictor swallowed a giraffe, and now we’re watching that bulge move through the system,” said Nace. In China, it takes about three years to build a coal plant.
The world has already warmed by 1 degree Celsius. All scenarios envisioned by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for holding planetary warming to around 1.5 degrees Celsius involve steep worldwide reductions in coal-power generation.
In that effort, other countries rely on Chinese manufacturing to hold down prices on solar panels. wind turbines and lithium-ion batteries.
“China has a really mixed record. On the one hand, it’s seen rapidly rising emissions over the past two decades,” said Jonas Nahm, an energy expert at Johns Hopkins University.
“On the other hand, it’s shown it’s able to innovate around manufacturing – and make new energy technologies available at scale, faster and cheaper.”
Source: SCMP

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10/08/2019

Collapse of intelligence pact between US, South Korea and Japan ‘will be symbolic victory for China’

  • Three-year-old security treaty between US and two key allies under threat as tensions between Seoul and Tokyo continue to escalate
  • End of General Security of Military Information Agreement risks undermining Washington’s influence in the region
South Korean protesters hold signs saying “No Abe” during a rally demanding the abolition of the General Security of Military Information Agreement. Photo: AP
South Korean protesters hold signs saying “No Abe” during a rally demanding the abolition of the General Security of Military Information Agreement. Photo: AP
The possible termination of a military information-sharing pact between South Korea and Japan would be a symbolic victory for China, a security analyst has warned.
Recent tension between the two countries recently threatened to spill over into the sphere of intelligence after Seoul signalled that it may pull out of the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) pact.

The agreement signed in 2016 enables three-way intelligence gathering between the US and its two allies and provides a crucial framework for coping with North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats.

But the escalating trade dispute between Seoul and Tokyo, prompted by a dispute about Japan’s colonial legacy, has left the future of the deal in jeopardy as the annual deadline for its renewal looms.

Japan approves first hi-tech exports to South Korea since start of ‘trade war’ – but with a warning

Ramon Pacheco Pardo, the first Korea chair at the Institute for European Studies at Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Belgium, said scrapping the pact would help strengthen China’s influence in the Asia-Pacific region at the expense of the US.

“It is undeniable that termination of GSOMIA would dent the US-South Korea-Japan alliance. The alliance system in northeast Asia will be weaker, strengthening China in relative terms in the process. “This could embolden China and Russia to strengthen their military cooperation in northeast Asia, said Pardo, a member of the non-governmental EU Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific.

“Ending GSOMIA would signal that South Korea and Japan are not ready to follow Washington’s lead in the way the latter would like, given the political capital that successive US administrations spent in convincing both countries to share intelligence.”

Ramon Pacheco Pardo said the collapse of the pact would have a largely symbolic impact on China. Photo: Facebook
Ramon Pacheco Pardo said the collapse of the pact would have a largely symbolic impact on China. Photo: Facebook

But Pardo also stressed that the intelligence alliance was not directly targeting China.

“While it is true that GSOMIA serves to connect the weakest link of the US-South Korea-Japan security triangle, ultimately South Korea’s security posture and the capabilities of each country independently mean that it is difficult to argue that the agreement is a concerted effort to contain China.”

“After all, Beijing does not share any significant information on North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes with South Korea, Japan or the US.

“This is not going to change any time soon. So the good news for China would be symbolic rather than substantial.”

US missiles, jittery neighbours and South Korea’s big security dilemma

Beijing warned on Tuesday that it would take “countermeasures” if the US deployed ground-based missiles in either Japan or South Korea, and Pardo argued that scrapping the intelligence-sharing pact would expose the weaknesses in their co-ordinated approach towards China.

The security deal is automatically renewed every year unless one party decides to pull out. To do so, it must notify the others 90 days before its expiry – a deadline that falls on August 23.

The trade row was sparked by a recent South Korean court ruling that Japanese should compensate individual victims of wartime forced labour. Tokyo believes it settled all necessary compensation under a treaty signed in 1965, but Seoul believes that individual victims’ right to file a claim has not expired.

Relations between South Korea and Japan have deteriorated following a court ruling over forced labour in the wartime era. Photo: Shutterstock
Relations between South Korea and Japan have deteriorated following a court ruling over forced labour in the wartime era. Photo: Shutterstock

Last week Japan said it would remove South Korea from its “white list” of countries with preferential trade status. Seoul has threatened to respond in kind, but also warned that it may reconsider whether to renew the intelligence-sharing pact.

Both the US and Japan have said they want the arrangement to continue, but Pardo said the effect of the termination would remain largely symbolic.

South Korea has already been investing in its own satellite and anti-submarine programmes to monitor the North’s activities, while Japan has also been developing its own intelligence programmes.

“This shows that neither South Korea nor Japan wants to rely on each other or third parties, namely the US, when it comes to monitoring North Korea’s military activities,” Pardo said.

But he argued that this behaviour already indicated that the alliance was weakening and suggested that terminating the treaty would increase China’s room for manoeuvre.

South Korea buys helicopters worth US$800 million after Trump seeks contribution for US presence

Since the 1990s successive US administrations have pushed for intelligence-sharing arrangements with Japan and South Korea to help build a framework to check Chinese and Russian military expansion in the Pacific.

“Beijing and Moscow are clearly moving in the direction of closer cooperation anyway. GSOMIA or not, military cooperation will continue … as long as Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin lead each country and most probably even beyond then,” Pardo said.

China and Russia flexed their muscles in the region last month as the trade dispute between the two key allies intensified.

Russian and Chinese long-range military aircraft conducted their first-ever joint air patrol over the Sea of Japan – also known as the East Sea – and the East China Sea.

“The East Asian security landscape would be reshaped insofar that China, North Korea and Russia would see that their main opponent in the region – the US – is unable to convince its two key allies, South Korea and Japan, to cooperate on a key issue,” Pardo said.

“The current dispute between South Korea and Japan will need a negotiated solution … In any case, Japan will have to learn to live with the fact that former colonisers will, from time to time, receive criticism by many of their former colonies, criticism that sometimes will escalate.

“It happens to former European colonial powers, for example, and it is only logical because the interpretation of the past is always in flux.”

Source: SCMP

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