Tag: Carbon Dioxide

The Price of Carbon Emissions Plunged in 2022, and That’s Not Good

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This chart, which hasn’t been published elsewhere, is disappointing. It shows a steep drop in 2022 in the global weighted average price per metric ton of carbon dioxide emissions: Making it more expensive to put greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is the market-oriented way to keep the planet from overheating. A high price tag on emissions gives emitters the incentive to switch to cleaner energy sources. It also raises the prices of energy-intensive products, encouraging consumers to choose ones that are friendlier to the environment. And so on. From a…

Republicans Assail Kerry Before His Climate Talks With China

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Republicans on Thursday accused John Kerry, President Biden’s special envoy for climate, of being soft on China as he prepared to travel to Beijing to restart discussions between the world’s top two polluting countries. In a contentious hearing before a House Committee on Foreign Affairs panel, Republicans attacked Mr. Kerry for not doing enough to persuade China to cut its greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, several also sought to portray Mr. Kerry as putting Chinese interests above those of the United States by negotiating with America’s top economic…

John Kerry to Visit China to Restart Climate Negotiations

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WASHINGTON — John Kerry, President Biden’s special envoy for climate change, said on Thursday he would travel to China next week to restart global warming negotiations between the world’s two largest polluters. Mr. Kerry’s trip will mark the first climate discussions between the United States and China since August, when Beijing cut off talks in anger after Nancy Pelosi, who was House speaker at the time, visited Taiwan. The talks come as the highest global temperatures ever recorded, driven by the burning of fossil fuels as well as the climate…

Europe Reaches Deal for Carbon Tax Law on Imports

Chin@Strategy

The European Union has taken a step closer to adopting a groundbreaking carbon tax law that would impose a tariff on imports from countries that fail to take strict steps to curb their greenhouse gas emissions. E.U. member states and the European Parliament reached a preliminary agreement on the proposed law on Monday night, and while the bill has yet to undergo legal checks and get final approval, E.U. officials said they expected it to easily clear the final hurdles. “A historic agreement,” said Pascal Canfin, the chair of the…

China Is Burning More Coal, a Growing Climate Challenge

Chin@Strategy

China is poised to take advantage of the global urgency to tackle climate change. It is the world’s dominant manufacturer and user of solar panels and wind turbines. It leads the world in producing energy from hydroelectric dams and is building more nuclear power plants than any other country. But China also burns more coal than the rest of the world combined and has accelerated mining and the construction of coal-fired power plants, driving up the country’s emissions of energy-related greenhouse gases nearly 6 percent last year, the fastest pace…

European Steel Plan Shows Biden’s Bid to Merge Climate and Trade Policy

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — President Biden has promised to use trade policy as a tool to mitigate climate change. This weekend, the administration provided its first look at how it plans to mesh those policy goals, saying the United States and the European Union would try to curb carbon emissions as part of a trade deal covering steel and aluminum. The arrangement, which American and European leaders aim to introduce by 2024, would use tariffs or other tools to encourage the production and trade of metals made with fewer carbon emissions in…

3 Big Questions Looming Over the Glasgow Climate Talks

Chin@Strategy

This article is part of the Debatable newsletter. You can sign up here to receive it on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Six years ago in Paris, world leaders celebrated a breakthrough in global climate politics: After more than two decades of failure, nearly every country finally agreed to reduce “as soon as possible” the amount of planet-warming greenhouse gases they were pumping into the atmosphere. Those leaders knew, though, that their pledges were woefully insufficient to avert disaster and would need to be ratcheted up at a later date. That is…

China’s New Climate Pledge Changes Little, in Bad Omen for COP26

Chin@Strategy

China formalized the pledges its leader announced last year, but the country went no further, in an official update of its targets to fight climate change, which were submitted on Thursday with the United Nations climate change agency. It foreshadows a grim start to the international climate talks in Glasgow next week, considering that China’s emissions account for the largest share in the world right now. It reflects the political and economic challenges within China in pivoting away from fossil fuels. China burns more coal than every other country combined…