China announced its plans for future cuts to greenhouse gas emissions on Wednesday, producing a scathing response from experts who said they were much too weak to stave off global catastrophe.
The world’s second-biggest economy is also the biggest source of carbon dioxide by far, and its decisions on how far and how fast to shift to a low-carbon model will determine whether the world can stay within relatively safe temperature bounds.
China’s plans are to cut emissions by between 7% and 10% of their peak by 2035 – a long way from the 30% cut that experts said was feasible and necessary.
Xi Jinping, the president of China, made the announcement at a summit of world leaders to discuss the climate crisis at the UN general assembly on Wednesday afternoon in New York.
Regardless, I don’t think anyone expected fusion soon enough to help with the climate crisis. Hopefully it will be there to continue to grow our society for the future, but we have to have human contribution to climate change effectively solved more quickly than we could get fusion.
Maybe it will help us stay in the green for the century or two it takes the climate to recover, assuming we haven’t passed any tipping points