China will be at the forefront of combating climate change by 2020 if it meets government targets on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the International Energy Agency suggests.
The finding contrasts sharply with the widespread image internationally of China as a country of inefficient, carbon-intensive industry that is resisting international calls to curb its emissions.
Fatih Birol, IEA chief economist, said: “If China reaches its targets – and in the past, it has reached most of its targets of this kind – its emissions [growth] will have declined so much by 2020 that it will be the country that has achieved the largest emission reductions. China will be at the forefront of combating climate change.”