China think-tank bleak on global climate goal

BEIJING (Reuters) – An international goal to limit global warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius appears unreachable even if China embarks on a vast effort to tame its growing greenhouse gas emissions, a Beijing think-tank has said.

The report cast doubt on the prospects for the world to stay within a commonly accepted threshold of dangerous climate change, to avoid worse droughts, floods and rising seas, two months after world leaders including China acknowledged the limit.

China’s Energy Research Institute also underlined in its new report concerns among developing countries that a goal to halve global greenhouses gases by 2050, resisted by China and other emerging economies, may cramp their growth.

Even if China embraces rigorous low-carbon policies, the chances were slim that the world could achieve that goal, said the report released in Beijing Wednesday.

“According to our calculations, these goals don’t in fact leave enough space for developing countries,” Bai Quan, one of the researchers who wrote the report, told a meeting marking its release.

Reuters