China says will boost energy efficiency drastically by 2020 to help fight global warming

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China announces plan to boost energy efficiency

BEIJING — China announced plans Thursday to drastically boost its energy efficiency as part of its contribution to the fight against global warming.

The State Council announcement ahead of next month’s Copenhagen climate summit pledges that China will cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by 40 to 45 percent by 2020 compared with levels in 2005.

The State Council, or Cabinet, said it “is a voluntary action taken by the Chinese government based on its own national conditions and is a major contribution to the global effort in tackling climate change.”

China announced earlier Thursday that Premier Wen Jiabao will take part in the Copenhagen meeting to show the country’s commitment to the global effort to reduce greenhouse emissions.

The announcements come after the White House said President Barack Obama will attend the start of the conference to personally commit the U.S. to a goal of substantially cutting greenhouse gases.

“We hope to reach a fair and reasonable arrangement” at Copenhagen, Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a news conference. “Wen’s attendance fully demonstrates the importance attached to this.”

The Dec. 7-18 conference is unlikely to produce a binding agreement. The original goal of the conference was to produce a new global climate change treaty to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. But in recent weeks it became clear that delegates were likely to produce at best an outline for an agreement to be considered late next year.

The White House said Obama will “put on the table” a U.S. commitment to cut emissions by 17 percent over the next decade, on the way to reducing heat-trapping pollution by 80 percent by mid-century.

China has said repeatedly it will seek binding pollution targets for developed countries and reject similar requirements for itself at the international meeting.

China has said it was unfair that all countries be required to play a role combating global warming since most of the environmental damage was caused by developed nations during their industrialization over the last 100 to 200 years.

China, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, has already said renewables such as solar and wind power will supply 15 percent of its energy needs by 2020. But Beijing is resisting binding emission caps.