Today China - the world's biggest carbon emitter - launched a pilot carbon trading scheme in the city of Shenzhen, across the border from Hong Kong. The scheme is expected to cover at least 635 companies, totalling a third of business emissions in the city. Pilots are also due to be rolled out in Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin and Chongqing, as well as in the provinces of Guangdong and Hubei. Their success could lead to a national Chinese emissions trading scheme in 2015.
According to the Financial Times, China's economic planning ministry has also indicated that it is considering an outright cap on emissions for its next five-year plan (2016-20). The US, responsible for 18% of the world's carbon emissions, and the EU, accounting for 14%, already have emission caps, so this would bring an additional 24% under a CO2 commitment, totalling 56% of global carbon emissions. This move by China could help to break a deadlock at the heart of UN climate talks, which are aiming to agree a legally binding global deal on cutting emissions – at a 2015 meeting in Paris – that would take effect from 2020.
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