[defrost]

> Does any country care?

China ostensibly cares, their five year plans drawn up by committees of Engineers (Civil, Mechanical, Electrical) and Scientists are on an arc to minimise reliance on fossil fuels and transition to renewables (wind, solar), and nuclear.

There are strategic reasons for this, of course.

> Isnt China far worse thsn the US?

"It's complicated"

* Historically the US is responsible for a greater mass of the CO2 humans have added to the atmosphere.

* Currently, China is adding more per annum (and India is in the bleeding edge mix also, as is Australia) in absolute terms, but still less(?) in per capita terms (having a much much larger population).

* China is still using coal (although they are on the cusp of peaking their use) - that gets thrown at them a lot, the caveats are

-- China shut down a lot of badly polluting inefficient coal power plants.

-- China opened up a lot of more up to date less polluting but still coal power plants.

-- China is using these to power all manner of stuff including the build out of the largest renewable power components production line in the world.

-- Coal is set to be phased out "soon" (and it seems to be slowly going that way, see peaked comment above).

* A lot of China's CO2 emissions are a direct result of their mineral processing, production, and assembly of the rest of the world's consumption.

( eg: The case can be argued that the fall in US per capita CO2 emissions is a result of US consumption now being met by manufacturing that has moved from the US to China)

There are literal books and stacks of research papers arguing about each point mentioned above - and that's just skimming the surface.

[kortilla]

> although they are on the cusp of peaking their use

That’s a really nice way of saying “their usage is currently at an all time high and will go up further”.

They don’t get to take credit for a potential future action.

[dghlsakjg]

Their carbon emissions in 2025 were lower than 2024. The peak was years ago. Same is true of coal usage.

So no, their usage is not at an all time high. It is below the high and on trend to continue falling.

They can take credit for past and current actions that are part of a long term plan that includes future action.

[kortilla]

Their coal as a source is still on the way up in total tons burned. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_in_China

Carbon declining from car usage switching to electric and moving to more efficient fuel plants is the decrease you’re thinking of.

Coal is still growing there, but the upside is it’s growing slightly slower than renewables so at least as a percentage it’s declining.

Unfortunately that just means their demand increased YoY so they had to build both dirty and clean energy.

This view makes it obvious because coal is at the bottom of the stack: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:China-electricity-pr...

[dghlsakjg]

Read your own source, it directly refutes what you are saying:

"In 2025, China's coal-fired power generation dropped by 1.9%, the first decrease since 2015, despite its energy demands has increased by 5% during that same year. According to Wood Mackenzie, the drop was attributed to a rapid increase in new non-fossil generation that has "finally outpaced demand growth", while coal plants had been operating at lower utilisation rates and being used more for grid flexibility and peak demand rather than baseload generation."

The graph you linked to conveniently ends right at peak coal consumption. If you go find the data for the last two years that are missing from that graph, coal consumption has been reduced.

You are all over this thread shitting on China unconditionally. We get it, you don't like China. But when your own sources disprove the point you are trying to make, it might be time to re-evaluate your position and probably the news sources that dictated that position to you. What was correct a decade ago, is very much false today, and the trend line is accelerating away from your feelings.

[kortilla]

I’m not shitting on China and that’s a red herring. I’m shitting on people who are praising China for being the #1 emitter who rapidly grew emissions long after the west realized how bad climate change was and was trying to correct them.

China actively built coal and continues to build coal fired generation far beyond the rest of the world.

The fact that the public charts are missing the recent decline is my mistake.

I don’t hate China, I hate people that pretend to care about the environment that glaze China when it’s very clear China optimized for its own citizens in the face of the west trying to grapple with climate change and is only now showing some signs of pivot with solar being cheap enough.

>What was correct a decade ago, is very much false today, and the trend line is accelerating away from your feelings.

I’m the one that gave a trend line. Your response was that it has slightly declined at the very end and the chart isn’t up to date. I don’t think you know what a trend line is.

Put your additional year or two on the end and it will just look like every other slight reprieve. Draw an actual, you know, moving average or anything else that establishes a “trend” and you’ll see China is not reacting to climate change very quickly.

[triceratops]

> I’m shitting on people who are praising China for being the #1 emitter

Largest country in the world is the largest emitter. Quelle surprise. Does Vatican City get a prize for being the smallest emitter?

> long after the west realized how bad climate change was and was trying to correct them.

The West led by the US whose adminstration currently denies the existence of climate change? Whose emissions drop was due to the fracking boom and natural gas becoming cheaper than coal? Let's not break our arms patting ourselves on the back. If fracking hadn't been invented how much coal would the US be burning today?

China burns coal because they have coal. If they had natural gas their emissions would be lower too. They know coal is bad and as you've admitted yourself, their coal use is down in 2025. It's projected to decrease even further by 2035.

They're deploying solar and wind and nuclear at a never-seen-before pace. Their factories produce plentiful cheap panels and batteries and EVs that the rest of the world can use to decarbonize - so at least there's a point to "the highest emissions in the world". The US is approving data centers with on-site gas turbines, and paying off windmill operators to shut down.

They are not the same.

> it’s very clear China optimized for its own citizens

Every country is supposed to do that. The current US administration is acting against its citizens' interests with its crusade against solar and wind energy.

> in the face of the west trying to grapple with climate change

How is the west doing that? All I see are more SUVs and people protesting solar generation facilities in the country and calling renewable energy and bike lanes "woke" or some nonsense.

> [China] is only now showing some signs of pivot with solar being cheap enough.

Who made solar so cheap, I wonder? Was it an accident or part of multiple 5-year plans that anyone can read?

And "some signs" is possibly the biggest understatement I've seen all year. They install more solar than the rest of the world combined.

Please, please re-examine your biases. Stop repeating the same conservative media lies. Start looking at the data objectively.

[triceratops]

I think you've made up your mind regardless of facts or data.

[kortilla]

I was the only one who provided any in this thread. You should read up on it!