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ABC News
2 hours ago
- ABC News
China's carbon emissions may have peaked thanks to renewables push
Climate experts say China's carbon emissions may have peaked, which could affect global climate targets, the fight against global warming — and the Australian coal industry. China is currently the world's biggest emitter, accounting for some 30 per cent of global carbon emissions, but a report by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) found that in the year to May 2025, China's CO2 emissions dropped 1.6 per cent. China policy expert at CREA Belinda Schäpe said the trend had also continued in the months since. Ms Schäpe told the ABC the finding was "really unique" because the only other times the country had recorded a year-on-year decline in CO2 emissions were during times of economic downturn, like the COVID-19 pandemic. "It's really quite a historic result," Ms Schäpe said. "It's due to a really rapid increase in renewables build-out in China that has translated into an increase in power generation coming from clean sources and driving down the coal share in the power mix, and with that, bringing down emissions." She said China led the world in green energy uptake. "In May [2025] alone, China built out 90 gigawatts of solar capacity, which is really huge. It translates to roughly 100 solar panels per second. "We are now at a point where solar and wind capacity is actually bigger than all thermal power capacity. So not only coal, but also including gas, oil and other fossil fuel sectors." Li Shuo, director of the China climate hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute, told the ABC he thought that despite previous emissions fluctuations, the country would continue to reduce its carbon output. "It certainly suggests that after three decades of very rapid economic growth, and also growth in China's emissions, the emission peak point for China has come very close, if it has not happened already," Mr Li said. "We have certainly entered into, if not yet an emission peak, a plateauing period for China's emissions. "We have entered a new phase of China's emissions, a phase that features a stabilisation of China's emissions and increasingly large-scale integration of China's renewable energy power, which, I hope, will actually make the country reduce its emissions from this point on." If the world is to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius, the amount of emissions released into the atmosphere needs to come down, not stabilise, according to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Climate experts say a failure to limit global warming below that figure will result in catastrophic consequences for people and the planet. Despite the rapid installation of renewable energy plants across the country, China is still building new coal-fired power plants. Beijing approved on average two coal-powered projects a week in 2022 and 2023, after power shortages in 2021. Belinda Schäpe said a backlog of these projects was now coming online, but they were using less coal. "There's been a significant drop in coal imports … in June, there was a 25 per cent year-on-year drop in coal imports," she said. "In June, China's power demand growth was actually 70 per cent higher than last year this time around, but solar and wind power generation met 89 per cent of that power demand growth. "That's what we've been seeing over the last six months, really, where renewables, or solar and wind in particular, accounted for 24 per cent of total electricity generation. Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged to continue phasing down the country's coal consumption in the next five years, between 2026 and 2030. Jorrit Gosens, a climate change and energy policy fellow at the Australian National University, said Australia needed to rethink the future of coal mines. "The writing is on the wall a little bit in the future economic potential of that industry," he said. China imports roughly 30 per cent of Australian thermal coal exports, making it Australia's largest market. Dr Gosens said China's increasing wind and solar power generation, combined with increasing domestic supplies of coal, created a "double whammy" for Australian coal exports. "It should be expected that those export volumes will continue to decrease over the next few years." Other Asian markets of Australian coal, such as South Korea and Japan, would follow suit as they decarbonised, he said. Dr Gosens pointed to the Mt Arthur coal mine in NSW, for which BHP could not find a buyer because of the shrinking demand of coal and its liabilities, like rehabilitation costs. He said local community leaders and the federal government needed to transition communities historically reliant on coal mines into other industries. "Currently, we're still seeing more resistance to change than embracing of that transition, which I think is a risky strategy given the demand for our product is not going to be determined by those local communities or by the federal government," he said. "Our best bet really is to make sure that there are viable alternatives for when it does get to that point." US President Donald Trump's policy agenda has seen green energy subsidies replaced with coal subsidies. Li Shou said it was clear that the two countries were now on different paths. He said some conservative forces within China may use the US's withdrawal from clean energy as motivation "for domestic inaction", but he was confident that it would not change the country's policy direction. "China has over the last decade or so become the superpower when it comes to wind technology — deploying and manufacturing wind, solar batteries and electric vehicles," he said. "This will not change because of what is happening or not happening in the US and if anything, Beijing will just continue with this green path because doing these things is ultimately in the country's long-term economic interest. "There has been a realisation on the Chinese side that they should continue and double down on their climate and environmental agenda, not because of the global situation and the US situation, but just for their own sake, to clean up the skies in major Chinese cities." China is set to announce its new climate reduction targets as part of the Paris agreement later this year. He said that would tell the world a lot about where the global appetite to reduce emissions was at. "Whether China chooses to coordinate with some of the other geopolitical powers will also tell us a lot about where the global climate agenda stands and to what extent countries, including China and Australia and the European Union, can still engage," Mr Li said.
SBS Australia
9 hours ago
- SBS Australia
Four Aussie residents, including two citizens, now facing Hong Kong arrest warrants, bounties
Four Australian residents are now facing overseas arrest warrants issued by Hong Kong's national security police, after a fresh announcement concerning support for a pro-democracy party in the state's parliament. Australian citizen Chongyi Feng and resident Wong Sau-Wo are accused of having launched a referendum or run as candidates in the unofficial "Hong Kong Parliament" group. They are among 19 activists who are are accused of organising or participating in the group that authorities in the Asian financial hub say aims at achieving self-determination and drafting a "Hong Kong constitution". Authorities say the group aims to subvert state power, under the law Beijing imposed in 2020 following months of pro-democracy protests in 2019. There is a bounty of at least HK$200,000 ($38,807) for each of the activists. Yam, who is a legal scholar, and Hui, a former Hong Kong Democracy party MP, were among eight overseas-based activists who authorities accused of national security offences, including foreign collusion and incitement to secession. At the time, the police also offered rewards of HK$1 million ($194,000) for information leading to each possible arrest. Foreign Minister Penny Wong has reacted to the announcement, saying "Australia strongly objects to Hong Kong authorities issuing arrest warrants for pro-democracy advocates in Australia." "Freedom of expression and assembly are essential to our democracy," she wrote on social media platform X on Saturday "We have consistently expressed our strong objections to China and Hong Kong on the broad and extraterritorial application of Hong Kong's national security legislation, and we will continue to do so." SBS News has reached out to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade for comment. Hong Kong's national security law Feng has told SBS News that, while he feels safe being in Australia, the federal government must remain cautious in its interactions with China. "So we need to be fully aware of the nature of (China's) authoritarian regime when dealing with Xi Jinping or the People's Republic of China." He says many of his friends in Hong Kong have been jailed due to the state's national security law, which makes perceived political subversion a serious offence. Critics of the national security law say authorities are using it to stifle dissent. Chinese and Hong Kong officials have repeatedly said the law was vital to restore stability after the city was rocked for months by sometimes violent anti-government and anti-China protests in 2019. "I feel quite sad that the autonomy of Hong Kong, of basic human rights in Hong Kong, and democracy in Hong Kong have all been destroyed by the implementation of the national security law," Feng said. Police reiterated that national security offences were serious crimes with extraterritorial reach and urged the wanted individuals to return to Hong Kong and turn themselves in. "If offenders voluntarily give up continuing to violate the crime, turn themselves in, truthfully confess their crimes, or provide key information that helps solve other cases, they may be eligible for reduced punishment," they said in a statement. Police also warned that aiding, abetting, or funding others to participate in the "Hong Kong Parliament" could be a criminal offence. Additional reporting by Wing Kuang and the Reuters News Agency.
The Australian
12 hours ago
- The Australian
‘Brown-noser': Crass statue appears outside Richard Marles electoral office in Geelong
A crass piece of political art has accused Richard Marles of being 'Australia's biggest brown-noser' as the defence minister signed a 50-year treaty alongside his UK counterpart. The installation, outside Mr Marles electoral office in Geelong, depicted a large nose with an apparent fecal smear. Affixed to a light post by chain, the work is attributed to The New Radicals and names Mr Marles. A piece of protest art was left in the Geelong CBD labelling Richard Marles "Australia's biggest brown-noser" on the day of the signing of the Geelong treaty. Picture X / @maximum_chips The art was cleaned up promptly and gone by 5pm. Picture: Supplied The protest art comes as Mr Marles signed a new five-decade treaty with the United Kingdom to cement the AUKUS submarine pact in his home city. Dubbed 'The Geelong Treaty', the defence minister said the agreement would enable co-operation on the SSN-Aukus submarine. 'In doing this, AUKUS will see 20,000 jobs in Australia. It will see, in building submarines in this country, the biggest industrial endeavour in our nation's history, bigger even than the Snowy Hydro scheme,' Mr Marles said. 'In military terms, what it will deliver is the biggest leap in Australia's military capability, really, since the formation of the navy back in 1913.' Deputy PM Richard Marles and UK Defence Secretary John Healey sign the Geelong Treaty. Picture: NewsWire / Luis Enrique Ascui The two men later enjoyed a Saturday beer. Picture: NewsWire / Luis Enrique Ascui The new treaty was announced following the annual AUKMIN talks in Sydney on Friday. Alongside his counterpart, UK Secretary of State for Defence John Healey, the two men celebrated the treaty with a beer at a Geelong brewery. Spotted in Geelong's CBD on Saturday afternoon, the piece has vanished by 5pm. Liam Beatty Journalist Liam Beatty is a court reporter with NCA NewsWire. He has previously worked in newsrooms in Victoria and Western Australia. Liam Beatty
