BEIJING — It was only three months ago that international energy officials revised a prediction that China would surpass the United States as the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases by 2009 or 2010. It could happen, they warned, as early as the end of this year.
That may have been conservative.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Saturday June 23, 2007 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 0 inches; 28 words Type of Material: Correction
China emissions: An article in Thursday's Section A about China's emissions of greenhouse gases said the nation had not ratified the Kyoto Protocol. It did so in 2002.
China's emissions of carbon dioxide, the most significant greenhouse gas, already have exceeded those of the United States, according to a report released this week by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency.
The study estimated that the surging demand for power from China's rapidly expanding economy caused carbon dioxide emissions to rise by 9% in 2006. That increase, coupled with a slight decline in the United States, meant that China's emissions for the year surpassed those of the U.S. by 8%, the Dutch report said.
A top official of the International Energy Agency, considered the authoritative source on global energy use and fossil fuel emissions, said Wednesday that there was little practical difference between his estimates and those by the Dutch agency.
"It is either this year, or it was 2006, or it will be 2008," said Fatih Birol, the agency's chief economist.
He said that what is important is the way China and the richer countries of the industrialized world respond to the changing situation.
Neither the United States nor China have ratified the 1997 Kyoto Protocol setting limits on greenhouse gas emissions. And as recently as this month's Group of 8 summit of leading industrialized nations in Germany, President Bush cited China as a reason for his continuing opposition to mandatory measures, which critics say impose specific standards on the most economically advanced nations but not on the developing world.
"We all can make major strides, and yet there won't be a reduction until China and India are participants," Bush told reporters at the G-8 conference. He supports non-mandatory goals.
The Dutch report signals a remarkable turn of events for a country that, though the world's most populous, was a distant also-ran among energy consumers until the last several decades, when the Communist government began market-oriented economic reforms. It also underscores the urgency felt in other global capitals about reining in China's greenhouse emissions.
"You know, it's just a continuous growth in the economy here that doesn't seem to slow down," said Jostein Nygard, a senior environmental specialist with the World Bank who is in Beijing to consult with energy officials about the emissions issue.
