【Illustration】On the third anniversary of the "dual carbon" goal, these major changes are taking place|" "Double Carbon" 3rd Anniversary (1)

Over the past two years, a succession of hot temperatures and torrential rains has made the perception of the climate crisis more real.

Three years ago today, China promised the world that its carbon dioxide emissions would peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. In addition, China has updated and strengthened the other four NDCs with 2030 as the time node.

The four goals are: by 2030, China's carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) will be reduced by more than 65% compared with 2005, the proportion of non-fossil energy in primary energy consumption will reach about 25%, forest stock will increase by 6 billion cubic meters compared with 2005, and the total installed capacity of wind power and solar power will reach more than 1.2 billion kilowatts.

Source: websites of national ministries

Last November, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment submitted a progress report on the targets to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The report shows that as of 2021, China's carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) were down 50.8% from 2005.

The "1+N" policy system provides guidance for these developments to occur. In October 2021, as the top-level design of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality, the Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Complete, Accurate and Comprehensive Implementation of the New Development Concept and the Action Plan for Carbon Peaking before 2030 were issued successively.

Since then, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other relevant departments have successively issued 12 implementation plans for key areas and key industries and 11 support and guarantee plans. 31 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) have also formulated their own implementation plans for carbon peaking. On August 15, 2023, Zhao Chenxin, Deputy Director of the National Development and Reform Commission, officially announced the completion of the "1+N" policy system for carbon peaking and carbon neutrality.

In the process of "dual carbon", energy as the largest emitting sector, its green and low-carbon transformation is regarded as the key.

As of 2022, China's coal consumption accounted for 56.2% of total energy consumption, and clean energy consumption, including natural gas, hydropower, nuclear power, wind power, solar energy, etc., accounted for 25.9% of total energy consumption.

In the power system, China's non-fossil energy power generation reached 36.2% in 2022, of which wind power accounted for 8.8% and photovoltaic power generation accounted for 4.9%, as disclosed in a report released by the General Institute of Electric Power Planning and Design last month.

This year, for the first time, the share of renewable energy installed capacity exceeded that of coal power. According to the National Development and Reform Commission, by the end of 2022, China's installed renewable energy capacity reached 1.213 billion kilowatts, accounting for 47.3% of the country's total installed power generation capacity, exceeding the proportion of coal power installed capacity (43.8%). By the end of March 2023, China's non-fossil energy generation capacity accounted for more than 50%.

As one of the first entities to be included in the national carbon market, power enterprises have a deeper understanding of the cost of emission reduction. As of September 14, 2023, the cumulative trading volume of carbon emission allowances in the national carbon market was 270 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, with a cumulative turnover of 13.05 billion yuan. After the closing price of the carbon market first stood at 70 yuan/ton mark on August 15 this year, it stabilized in the range of 67-75 yuan/ton.

The issuance of National Certified Voluntary Emission Reductions (CCER), another trading instrument in the national carbon market, is also expected to restart this year. In June 2023, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment made the above commitments at a regular press conference, and subsequently issued the Administrative Measures for Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Trading (Trial) (Draft for Comments) for public comment.

In addition to market mechanisms, policy adjustments also occur.

Following the first signal of the adjustment of the "dual control" system of energy consumption released by the Central Economic Work Conference in 2021, the report of the 20th National Congress released in October 2022 once again emphasized that it is necessary to improve the regulation of total energy consumption and intensity, focus on controlling fossil energy consumption, and gradually shift to the "dual control" system of total carbon emission and intensity.

In November 2022, the National Development and Reform Commission, the National Bureau of Statistics and the National Energy Administration successively issued the Notice on Further Improving the Work on Excluding Raw Energy Use from the Control of Total Energy Consumption and the Notice on Further Doing a Good Job in the Work Related to the Exclusion of New Renewable Energy Consumption from the Total Energy Consumption Control, clarifying the detailed rules and tasks for all localities to implement the new version of the "dual control" system.

On July 11 this year, the second meeting of the Central Committee for Comprehensively Deepening Reform deliberated and adopted the "Opinions on Promoting the Gradual Shift from Dual Control of Energy Consumption to Dual Control of Carbon Emissions", which may indicate that China's "dual carbon" strategy is entering the next stage.

In the field of transportation, the process of cleaning is accelerating. In 2022, the production of new energy vehicles increased by 90.5% from the previous year to 7.003 million units. At present, the market penetration rate of new energy vehicles exceeds 30%, and the domestic number of new energy vehicles has reached 16.2 million units.

Emissions reductions have helped China create new economic growth advantages. The total exports of new energy vehicles, photovoltaic cells and lithium batteries, collectively known as the "new three", increased by 61.6% in the first half of 2023, driving the overall export growth by 1.8 percentage points.

Limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels is a goal agreed by countries around the world at COP 21 in 2015.

In November, the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will conduct the first global stocktake of countries' climate action. The UNFCCC recently released a comprehensive global inventory report showing that the current situation of global greenhouse gas emissions has not yet reached the 1.5 degree temperature control target, and the window period for countries to act is rapidly narrowing.

(Interface news reporter Zhuang Jian also contributed to this article)