Delegates at the 61st meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in Sofia, Bulgaria have failed to agree on a timeline for the upcoming seventh assessment report.
The week-long meeting saw more than 230 delegates from 195 member governments revisit an unresolved topic from the previous meeting in January – finalising the timeline for the IPCC’s seventh assessment report (AR7) cycle.
AR7 will be the IPCC’s latest round of reports summarising the most recently published climate science.
First published in 1990, the assessment reports typically take 6-7 years to complete. AR6’s concluding “summary for policymakers” was published in March last year.
Many countries said in Sofia that they favoured an accelerated timeline, in which all three “working group” reports would be completed by June 2028. This deadline would allow the findings to inform the UN’s second global stocktake, which will gauge progress towards the Paris Agreement goals.
Ahead of last week’s meeting, a group of 40 IPCC authors from developing countries published an open letter arguing that the AR7 reports “can and must” be produced by this date in order to remain policy-relevant.
However, countries including Kenya, India, China and South Africa opposed the accelerated timeline, warning that “haste leads to shoddy work” and saying that raising concerns that the decision was being rushed through.
Ultimately, the decision was delayed. The issue will be picked up again after the AR7 scoping meeting in December.
Delegates in Sofia had more success in agreeing outlines for the special report on “climate change and cities” and the methodology report on “short-lived climate forcers”, both of which will be published in 2027.
Tricky talks in Turkey
Following the completion of its sixth assessment report (AR6) last year, the IPCC’s attention has now turned to its seventh assessment (AR7).
In a four-day meeting in Istanbul in January, which focused on the IPCC’s “programme of work” for AR7, governments decided against adopting a new structure and instead committed to the traditional set of three “working group” reports and a final synthesis report.
Before the Istanbul meeting, governments had already agreed that the AR7 cycle would include a special report on climate change and cities, as well as a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers.
The meeting then saw the addition of a second methodology report on carbon dioxide removal technologies, carbon capture utilisation and storage, plus a revision to the IPCC’s 1994 technical guidelines on impacts and adaptation.
However, while there was agreement between government delegates on the selection of reports, a timeline for their delivery was not agreed.
The majority of countries meeting in Istanbul favoured delivering the working group reports on an “accelerated” timeline, which would see them published by the end of 2028. This would allow the reports to “inform” the UN’s second global stocktake (GST), which will gauge progress towards the Paris Agreement goals.
However, a few countries, including Saudi Arabia, India and China, “strenuously objected” to this timetable, reported the Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB), which has unique access to the closed talks.
It reported, for example, that Saudi Arabia “opposed the shorter timeline, saying this would lead to compromised working groups reports both in content and inclusivity”. While China “emphasised that AR7 aims to be inclusive and developing country scientists should be given time to make their contributions”.
As opposition to the accelerated timeline “held fast” – despite the meeting overrunning into a fifth day – no decision was made.
The final “decisions adopted” document instead requested that the IPCC bureau – experts with more managerial roles, including vice and co-chairs – prepare a document “outlining the month and year of delivery on the basis of an AR7 strategic plan, taking into account the different views expressed” in the meeting.
The instruction included an “oblique reference” to taking “into account” the GST, noted ENB. The report, it was decided, would be presented at the Sofia meeting “for consideration and decision”.
Decision delayed
A key goal of the meeting in Sofia last week was to nail down a timeline for AR7. Ahead of the meeting, a group of 40 IPCC authors from developing countries sent a letter arguing that the AR7 reports “can and must” be produced by 2028, in time to inform the second GST report.
On 31 July, former IPCC vice chair Dr Youba Sokona – a co-author of the letter – published a commentary in Climate Home News summarising its main arguments. He argued that “ensuring the IPCC cycle aligns with GST timelines is crucial for maintaining the integrity of international climate cooperation”, adding that, without input from the IPCC, the stocktake “may lack essential southern perspective”.
He also dismissed concerns that accelerating the timeline would compromise the robustness of the reports, or lead to under-representation of developing countries. The article also outlined ways these concerns could be addressed while implementing an accelerated timeline.
Dr Frederieke Otto – a senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment and IPCC AR6 author – tells Carbon Brief that, in her view, the Working Group II (WG2) and III (WG3) reports are “really needed before the GST”.
Typically, the three working group reports focus on “the physical science basis”, “impacts, adaptation and vulnerability” and “mitigation of climate change”.
On the morning of 31 July, Dr Jim Skea – the IPCC chair for AR7 – presented a proposed schedule for AR7. The proposal was requested by the IPCC panel at the 60th session in Istanbul in January. It was developed by the co-chairs of the IPCC working groups and the Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (TFI), then reviewed by the IPCC bureau.
Under this schedule, the AR7 cycle would last six-and-a-half years – similar to the fifth and sixth assessment cycles.
In the discussion that followed, a long list of countries supported the schedule as proposed, with many underscoring the importance of feeding into the second GST, according to the ENB’s summary of the entire meeting.
Belize, supported by the US, the Netherlands and the UK, said IPCC reports need to be ready for the Bonn Climate Change Conference in June 2028, according to the ENB. Belize added that “an inclusive cycle is only meaningful if it can feed into the GST”.
Saint Kitts and Nevis argued that the absence of “crucial” IPCC input into the GST would mean the IPCC would lose policy relevance. The country also argued that the schedule for AR7 is “neither compressed nor rushed”, because, while it is shorter than the schedule for AR6, it also contains fewer special reports.
The AR6 cycle included three special reports – on 1.5C of global warming in 2018, then, successively in 2019, on climate change and land, and the ocean and cryosphere.
(Discussions about linking IPCC reports with the GST are long-standing. During 2016-18, the IPCC panel “agreed to draft terms of reference for a task group on the organisation of future work of the IPCC in light of the GST under the Paris Agreement”, according to the ENB.)
Finland argued that “if we want science-based policymaking, the faster we have the next report, the faster policymakers are able to take science-based policy action”, according to the ENB. And many small-island developing nations also “underscored the critical importance of timely reports from small island developing states [SIDS] and less-developed countries”.
Several countries, including Brazil, Peru and the UK, “stressed that inclusivity concerns could be addressed in ways other than an extended timeline”.
However, several countries, including India, Algeria, Kenya, the Russian Federation and South Africa, argued that a longer timeline is needed to ensure “robust, rigorous scientific outputs, and to ensure greater inclusivity”.
India called the proposed schedule “unprecedented,” saying that the fourth and fifth assessment cycles had similar timeframes, but did not include special reports. It also argued that “producing the best science needs time, haste leads to shoddy work and retracted publications”, according to the ENB.
Kenya, supported by India and South Africa, warned that there are “major” gaps in literature on adaptation in Africa. It said that the “short time” between AR7 scoping meetings and the first author meetings may not be sufficient to identify and fill “literature gaps” for the continent.
And South Africa and Saudi Arabia opposed expediting the schedule to feed into the stocktake, suggesting this would not make the IPCC more “policy-relevant,” but more “policy-prescriptive.”
Dr David Lapola is a research scientist at the University of Campinas in Brazil and AR6 contributing author. He tells Carbon Brief that, “while inclusiveness is super important to bring more legitimacy to the process, it also slows down decisions when you have to have the agreement of all members”. He says that it is a “great challenge to imprint more agility to the IPCC decision processes without compromising inclusiveness”.
On the evening of 1 August, Skea “noted how difficult it had been to find a solution that satisfied all delegations” and he proposed to postpone a decision on the timeline until after the AR7 scoping meeting in December 2024.
In a press release published after the meeting closed, the IPCC stated that “at its next plenary in early 2025, the panel will agree on their respective scope, outlines and work plans, including schedules and budgets”.
“While some expressed disappointment about the lack of consensus, others were quick to point out that determining the timeline after the scoping meeting for the working groups is consistent with past practice and the IPCC’s principles and procedures”, says the ENB.
Dr Hannah Hughes is a senior lecturer in international politics and climate change at Aberystwyth University, who has written extensively about the IPCC. She tells Carbon Brief that it is “not surprising” that the decision has been further postponed. She explains that the IPCC is “balancing complex and competing dynamics”.
She adds:
“Delaying the finalisation of the timeline until after the scoping of reports offers the advantage of having a clear sense of the advances in science and the level of urgency in communicating these.”
However, Otto tells Carbon Brief that it will be “difficult to scope without a timeline”. She says that “with the decision postponed, it seems that conflicts could not be resolved, but everything is just postponed”.
What additional reports were discussed in Sofia?
Earlier this year, IPCC held scoping meetings (in Latvia and Australia, respectively) for a special report on climate change and cities and a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers – both of which are due for publication in 2027. The proposals suggested at these meetings were discussed in Sofia.
Special report on climate change and cities
In 2016, the IPCC decided to produce a special report on climate change and cities. A “cities and climate change science conference” was held in Canada in 2018 to “inspire the next frontier of research focused on the science of cities and climate change”. A scoping meeting was held in Latvia over 16-19 April 2024 to develop a proposed outline for the report.
On 27 July in Sofia, Diana Ürge-Vorsatz – IPCC vice-chair and chair of the scientific steering committee (SSC) for the cities report – presented the proposal.
Under the proposal, the report will have five main chapters. The first will provide framing for the report, the second will discuss “trends, challenges and opportunities” in a changing climate and the third will be called “actions and solutions to reduce urban risks and emissions”. The final two chapters will focus on facilitating change and solutions.
Ürge-Vorsatz also suggested a timeline in which authors for the report will be selected by the end of 2024 and the first meetings of lead authors will be held in 2025. The expert review of the first order draft will take place by the end of 2025, and 15-19 March 2027 will see the “approval of the summary for policymakers and acceptance of the special report”.
In Sofia, many countries proposed changes or raised queries, according to ENB. For example, countries including India, South Africa and Malawi questioned how cities are defined. Burundi, Kenya and Mauritius said early warning systems should be given more prominence. And countries including Burundi, Malaysia and Kenya called for a more “balanced consideration of adaptation and mitigation”.
Over the following days, there were multiple more rounds of comments and drafts. For example, India questioned the shift from “loss and damage” to “losses and damages” implemented in one of the drafts, noting IPCC precedents for use of the latter terminology are limited to one document.
Saudi Arabia opposed the use of “net-zero goals” for cities, saying that these are country-level objectives. And Kenya, supported by India and Algeria, “called for improvements in the way adaptation was addressed throughout the outline”, including the removal of a reference to “maladaptation”.
By 31 July, most countries had accepted the proposal. But others – including Saudi Arabia, India and Kenya – were continuing to raise concerns and to call for a chapter-by-chapter discussion of the report outline.
Skea said the situation was “at a crossroads, given the difficulty of opening only a few non-consensual issues without risking an unravelling, and [he] invited the SSC to confer on whether the issues expressed could be somehow incorporated without unacceptable implications”, according to the ENB.
Timor-Leste, supported by the US and the Netherlands, urged countries to reach a compromise in time for the end of the meeting, noting their delegation consists of a single person. But India, Saudi Arabia and Kenya “expressed concern with other delegations’ ‘refusal to engage’ with their concerns”.
A “huddle” was set up to address some of the key concerns and, on 2 August, the delegates approved a draft decision.
Dr Aromar Revi is the founding director of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements and author on multiple IPCC reports. He tells Carbon Brief that the approval of the outline for an IPCC special report on cities is “a historic step that brings the urban and infrastructure transition, up front and centre of the climate action solutions space”.
He adds:
“It has taken almost a decade of preparation by a wide range of urban and climate actors to make this possible, since it was first suggested in 2016 as a special report in the AR6 cycle…
“This report will be especially important to cities and urban areas in Asia, Africa and Latin America and the SIDS, where 90% of the incremental urban population will live over the next 30-odd years, often in informal settlements with poor services and high vulnerability.”
Revi adds that the proposed timescale, which would see the work completed by March 2027, sets a “high bar” for the authorship team.
Prof Lisa Schipper – a professor of development geography at the University of Bonn and IPCC AR6 author – tells Carbon Brief that the cities report “will be a critical meeting point of adaptation, mitigation and development agendas”.
She adds:
“I was happy to see the level of detail in the cities [report] outline. Normally, the IPCC report outlines are a shopping list of topics without any normative framing. This makes it challenging to write the report with a consistent narrative. I think IPCC member countries will find more relatable and usable content in the cities report.”
The report “will be arriving at a crucial time”, adds Dr Zachary Labe – a scientist at the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, noting that many cities are “leading examples of how to design and implement evidence-based climate action through adaptation and mitigation practices”.
“The calls for nominations of authors are scheduled for release as early as next week,” according to the IPCC press release.
Short-lived climate forcers methodology report
In 2019, the IPCC decided that the TFI should produce a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs) – gases and particulates, such as methane and carbon, that cause global warming, but typically only stay in the atmosphere for less than two decades.
At the 60th session in January 2024, the panel decided to produce the report by 2027. A scoping meeting for the report was held on 26-28 February 2024 in Brisbane, Australia.
On the first day of the 61st session, Dr Takeshi Enoki, the co-chair of the TFI, presented an overview of the group’s recommendations. He suggested a title for the report of “2027 supplement to the 2006 IPCC guidelines for national greenhouse gas inventories: short-lived climate forcers (2027 supplement on SLCFs)”, and said the report would be a supplement to the 2006 guidelines.
They added that the report would be made up of an overview chapter and five “volumes” following the format of the 2006 IPCC guidelines. These five volumes will focus on “general guidance”, the energy sector, industrial processes and product use, the agriculture, forestry and other land use sector, and waste, he said.
However, many countries raised concerns. First, there was disagreement about whether or not to include hydrogen and PM2.5 – particulate matter with a diameter of under 2.5 micrometres – in the report.
China, India, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, among others, argued that they should not be included, as the literature supporting their inclusion is not robust enough, the ENB says. However, it adds that many other countries – including the US, Canada and Chile – supported its inclusion.
Second, the title of the report was called into question. India said that linking the report to the 2006 guidelines “creates a whole new set of obligations and commitments through other channels”. It, along with Saudi Arabia, called for the report to be changed back to a standalone document. However, Denmark, Germany, Spain and Morocco expressed support for the current format.
A series of huddles were held to iron out these disagreements. On 2 August, the delegates agreed to change the name of the report to “2027 IPCC methodology report on inventories for short-lived climate forcers”.
However, in the absence of consensus on the case for including PM2.5 and hydrogen, the panel decided to come back to this discussion in the future.
What else was agreed in Sofia?
Updates on a range of other IPCC activities were also given, including the IPCC scholarship programme, terms of reference for the IPCC publication committee, and progress reports aimed at increasing accountability and transparency in the IPCC process.
Expert meetings
Ahead of the meeting in Sofia, the IPCC had already decided to limit the production of new special reports in line with the reported preferences of IPCC chair Jim Skea, who previously promised that he would strongly resist pressure to produce more reports.
The limited number of special reports was, in part, to allow more time for expert meetings or workshops. On 2 August, working group one co-chair Prof Xiaoye Zhang introduced the options for expert meetings and workshops for AR7, “highlighting the need for cross-working group collaboration”, according to the ENB.
He noted that expert meetings on reconciling land-use emissions and on CO2 removal technologies had been held in July 2024. Another meeting on gender, diversity and inclusivity has already been “tentatively” scheduled for later this year, and a workshop on the IPCC inventory software will be held in late August 2024.
Ahead of the meeting in Sofia, IPCC co-chairs and their working group bureaus had also proposed a range of extra meetings for 2025-26.
IPCC co-chair for working group one – Dr Robert Vautard – outlined the proposal for a meeting on high impacts and tipping points. The proposal suggests that 60 experts meet in April 2025 to “prepare consensus for the working group-specific assessments addressing
this important topic subject to intense research and debates in the community”.
Vautard explained that the meeting would be led by WG1, but include contributions from all working groups. He added that the meeting will receive financial support from the World Climate Research Programme.
Many countries supported this meeting, with Ukraine calling tipping points “the elephant in the room”. However, India opposed the meeting, saying it spans too many topics. And Saudi Arabia said the meeting is not needed as tipping points will be discussed in the WG1 report.
A meeting on “adaptation guidelines, metrics and indicators” was also proposed. Several countries, including Kenya and Saudi Arabia, said adaptation should be a priority in this cycle, according to the ENB
Finally, a meeting on “novel approaches to assessing knowledge on climate change and society’s responses” was suggested. Australia, Chile, France and others expressed support of this meeting, with many highlighting the importance of Indigenous knowledge and collaboration with the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.
Health, overshoot and science communication were also identified among other key areas of interest for AR7.
Improving inclusivity
“The one issue on which all delegates seemed to agree was the need to enhance the inclusivity of the IPCC’s work in both its process and products,” the ENB says.
WG3 co-chair Prof Joy Pereira stressed that the bureau is committed to AR7 products being inclusive in terms of author representation and literature assessment, and pointed to a document on improving inclusivity in AR7.
The document suggests setting the agenda for the expert meeting on gender, diversity and inclusivity – which is planned in late 2024 or early 2025 – and providing training on inclusive practices for lead authors and contributing lead authors during the first lead author meeting.
Efforts will also be taken to sponsor measures such as internet access and access to literature for IPCC scientists, according to the document.
(Carbon Brief’s analysis on the change in diversity of IPCC authors over the past three decades highlights access to literature as a key barrier for IPCC authors from less wealthy institutions.)
The post IPCC meeting in Sofia fails to agree timeline for seventh assessment report appeared first on Carbon Brief.
IPCC meeting in Sofia fails to agree timeline for seventh assessment report
Drought and heatwaves occurring together – known as “compound” events – have “surged” across the world since the early 2000s, a new study shows.
Compound drought and heat events (CDHEs) can have devastating effects, creating the ideal conditions for intense wildfires, such as Australia’s “Black Summer” of 2019-20 where bushfires burned 24m hectares and killed 33 people.
The research, published in Science Advances, finds that the increase in CDHEs is predominantly being driven by events that start with a heatwave.
The global area affected by such “heatwave-led” compound events has more than doubled between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, the study says.
The rapid increase in these events over the last 23 years cannot be explained solely by global warming, the authors note.
Since the late 1990s, feedbacks between the land and the atmosphere have become stronger, making heatwaves more likely to trigger drought conditions, they explain.
One of the study authors tells Carbon Brief that societies must pay greater attention to compound events, which can “cause severe impacts on ecosystems, agriculture and society”.
Compound events
CDHEs are extreme weather events where drought and heatwave conditions occur simultaneously – or shortly after each other – in the same region.
These events are often triggered by large-scale weather patterns, such as “blocking” highs, which can produce “prolonged” hot and dry conditions, according to the study.
Prof Sang-Wook Yeh is one of the study authors and a professor at the Ewha Womans University in South Korea. He tells Carbon Brief:
“When heatwaves and droughts occur together, the two hazards reinforce each other through land-atmosphere interactions. This amplifies surface heating and soil moisture deficits, making compound events more intense and damaging than single hazards.”
CDHEs can begin with either a heatwave or a drought.
The sequence of these extremes is important, the study says, as they have different drivers and impacts.
For example, in a CDHE where the heatwave was the precursor, increased direct sunshine causes more moisture loss from soils and plants, leading to a drought.
Conversely, in an event where the drought was the precursor, the lack of soil moisture means that less of the sun’s energy goes into evaporation and more goes into warming the Earth’s surface. This produces favourable conditions for heatwaves.
The study shows that the majority of CDHEs globally start out as a drought.
In recent years, there has been increasing focus on these events due to the devastating impact they have on agriculture, ecosystems and public health.
In Russia in the summer of 2010, a compound drought-heatwave event – and the associated wildfires – caused the death of nearly 55,000 people, the study notes.
The record-breaking Pacific north-west “heat dome” in 2021 triggered extreme drought conditions that caused “significant declines” in wheat yields, as well as in barley, canola and fruit production in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada, says the study.
Increasing events
To assess how CDHEs are changing, the researchers use daily reanalysis data to identify droughts and heatwaves events. (Reanalysis data combines past observations with climate models to create a historical climate record.) Then, using an algorithm, they analyse how these events overlap in both time and space.
The study covers the period from 1980 to 2023 and the world’s land surface, excluding polar regions where CDHEs are rare.
The research finds that the area of land affected by CDHEs has “increased substantially” since the early 2000s.
Heatwave-led events have been the main contributor to this increase, the study says, with their spatial extent rising 110% between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, compared to a 59% increase for drought-led events.
The map below shows the global distribution of CDHEs over 1980-2023. The charts show the percentage of the land surface affected by a heatwave-led CDHE (red) or a drought-led CDHE (yellow) in a given year (left) and relative increase in each CDHE type (right).
The study finds that CDHEs have occurred most frequently in northern South America, the southern US, eastern Europe, central Africa and south Asia.
Threshold passed
The authors explain that the increase in heatwave-led CDHEs is related to rising global temperatures, but that this does not tell the whole story.
In the earlier 22-year period of 1980-2001, the study finds that the spatial extent of heatwave-led CDHEs rises by 1.6% per 1C of global temperature rise. For the more-recent period of 2022-23, this increases “nearly eightfold” to 13.1%.
The change suggests that the rapid increase in the heatwave-led CDHEs occurred after the global average temperature “surpasse[d] a certain temperature threshold”, the paper says.
This threshold is an absolute global average temperature of 14.3C, the authors estimate (based on an 11-year average), which the world passed around the year 2000.
Investigating the recent surge in heatwave-leading CDHEs further, the researchers find a “regime shift” in land-atmosphere dynamics “toward a persistently intensified state after the late 1990s”.
In other words, the way that drier soils drive higher surface temperatures, and vice versa, is becoming stronger, resulting in more heatwave-led compound events.
Daily data
The research has some advantages over other previous studies, Yeh says. For instance, the new work uses daily estimations of CDHEs, compared to monthly data used in past research. This is “important for capturing the detailed occurrence” of these events, says Yeh.
He adds that another advantage of their study is that it distinguishes the sequence of droughts and heatwaves, which allows them to “better understand the differences” in the characteristics of CDHEs.
Dr Meryem Tanarhte is a climate scientist at the University Hassan II in Morocco, and Dr Ruth Cerezo Mota is a climatologist and a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Both scientists, who were not involved in the study, agree that the daily estimations give a clearer picture of how CDHEs are changing.
Cerezo-Mota adds that another major contribution of the study is its global focus. She tells Carbon Brief that in some regions, such as Mexico and Africa, there is a lack of studies on CDHEs:
“Not because the events do not occur, but perhaps because [these regions] do not have all the data or the expertise to do so.”
However, she notes that the reanalysis data used by the study does have limitations with how it represents rainfall in some parts of the world.
Compound impacts
The study notes that if CDHEs continue to intensify – particularly events where heatwaves are the precursors – they could drive declining crop productivity, increased wildfire frequency and severe public health crises.
These impacts could be “much more rapid and severe as global warming continues”, Yeh tells Carbon Brief.
Tanarhte notes that these events can be forecasted up to 10 days ahead in many regions. Furthermore, she says, the strongest impacts can be prevented “through preparedness and adaptation”, including through “water management for agriculture, heatwave mitigation measures and wildfire mitigation”.
The study recommends reassessing current risk management strategies for these compound events. It also suggests incorporating the sequences of drought and heatwaves into compound event analysis frameworks “to enhance climate risk management”.
Cerezo-Mota says that it is clear that the world needs to be prepared for the increased occurrence of these events. She tells Carbon Brief:
“These [risk assessments and strategies] need to be carried out at the local level to understand the complexities of each region.”
The post Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes
Greenhouse Gases
DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Energy crisis
ENERGY SPIKE: US-Israeli attacks on Iran and subsequent counterattacks across the Middle East have sent energy prices “soaring”, according to Reuters. The newswire reported that the region “accounts for just under a third of global oil production and almost a fifth of gas”. The Guardian noted that shipping traffic through the strait of Hormuz, which normally ferries 20% of the world’s oil, “all but ground to a halt”. The Financial Times reported that attacks by Iran on Middle East energy facilities – notably in Qatar – triggered the “biggest rise in gas prices since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine”.
‘RISK’ AND ‘BENEFITS’: Bloomberg reported on increases in diesel prices in Europe and the US, speculating that rising fuel costs could be “a risk for president Donald Trump”. US gas producers are “poised to benefit from the big disruption in global supply”, according to CNBC. Indian government sources told the Economic Times that Russia is prepared to “fulfil India’s energy demands”. China Daily quoted experts who said “China’s energy security remains fundamentally unshaken”, thanks to “emergency stockpiles and a wide array of import channels”.
‘ESSENTIAL’ RENEWABLES: Energy analysts said governments should cut their fossil-fuel reliance by investing in renewables, “rather than just seeking non-Gulf oil and gas suppliers”, reported Climate Home News. This message was echoed by UK business secretary Peter Kyle, who said “doubling down on renewables” was “essential” amid “regional instability”, according to the Daily Telegraph.
China’s climate plan
PEAK COAL?: China has set out its next “five-year plan” at the annual “two sessions” meeting of the National People’s Congress, including its climate strategy out to 2030, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post. The plan called for China to cut its carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 17% from 2026 to 2030, which “may allow for continued increase in emissions given the rate of GDP growth”, reported Reuters. The newswire added that the plan also had targets to reach peak coal in the next five years and replace 30m tonnes per year of coal with renewables.
ACTIVE YET PRUDENT: Bloomberg described the new plan as “cautious”, stating that it “frustrat[es] hopes for tighter policy that would drive the nation to peak carbon emissions well before president Xi Jinping’s 2030 deadline”. Carbon Brief has just published an in-depth analysis of the plan. China Daily reported that the strategy “highlights measures to promote the climate targets of peaking carbon dioxide emissions before 2030”, which China said it would work towards “actively yet prudently”.
Around the world
- EU RULES: The European Commission has proposed new “made in Europe” rules to support domestic low-carbon industries, “against fierce competition from China”, reported Agence France-Presse. Carbon Brief examined what it means for climate efforts.
- RECORD HEAT: The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said there is a 50-60% chance that the El Niño weather pattern could return this year, amplifying the effect of global warming and potentially driving temperatures to “record highs”, according to Euronews.
- FLAGSHIP FUND: The African Development Bank’s “flagship clean energy fund” plans to more than double its financing to $2.5bn for African renewables over the next two years, reported the Associated Press.
- NO WITHDRAWAL: Vanuatu has defied US efforts to force the Pacific-island nation to drop a UN draft resolution calling on the world to implement a landmark International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on climate, according to the Guardian.
98
The number of nations that submitted their national reports on tackling nature loss to the UN on time – just half of the 196 countries that are part of the UN biodiversity treaty – according to analysis by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- Sea levels are already “much higher than assumed” in most assessments of the threat posed by sea-level rise, due to “inadequate” modelling assumptions | Nature
- Accelerating human-caused global warming could see the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C limit crossed before 2030 | Geophysical Research Letters covered by Carbon Brief
- Future “super El Niño events” could “significantly lower” solar power generation due to a reduction in solar irradiance in key regions, such as California and east China | Communications Earth & Environment
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
UK greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 fell to 54% below 1990 levels, the baseline year for its legally binding climate goals, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Over the same period, data from the World Bank shows that the UK’s economy has expanded by 95%, meaning that emissions have been decoupling from growth.
Spotlight
Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ community wind turbine
Following the recent launch of the UK government’s local power plan, Carbon Brief visits one of the country’s community-energy success stories.
The Lawrence Weston housing estate is set apart from the main city of Bristol, wedged between the tree-lined grounds of a stately home and a sprawl of warehouses and waste incinerators. It is one of the most deprived areas in the city.
Yet, just across the M5 motorway stands a structure that has brought the spoils of the energy transition directly to this historically forgotten estate – a 4.2 megawatt (MW) wind turbine.
The turbine is owned by local charity Ambition Lawrence Weston and all the profits from its electricity sales – around £100,000 a year – go to the community. In the UK’s local power plan, it was singled out by energy secretary Ed Miliband as a “pioneering” project.
‘Sustainable income’
On a recent visit to the estate by Carbon Brief, Ambition Lawrence Weston’s development manager, Mark Pepper, rattled off the story behind the wind turbine.
In 2012, Pepper and his team were approached by the Bristol Energy Cooperative with a chance to get a slice of the income from a new solar farm. They jumped at the opportunity.
“Austerity measures were kicking in at the time,” Pepper told Carbon Brief. “We needed to generate an income. Our own, sustainable income.”
With the solar farm proving to be a success, the team started to explore other opportunities. This began a decade-long process that saw them navigate the Conservative government’s “ban” on onshore wind, raise £5.5m in funding and, ultimately, erect the turbine in 2023.
Today, the turbine generates electricity equivalent to Lawrence Weston’s 3,000 households and will save 87,600 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) over its lifetime.
‘Climate by stealth’
Ambition Lawrence Weston’s hub is at the heart of the estate and the list of activities on offer is seemingly endless: birthday parties, kickboxing, a library, woodworking, help with employment and even a pop-up veterinary clinic. All supported, Pepper said, with the help of a steady income from community-owned energy.
The centre itself is kitted out with solar panels, heat pumps and electric-vehicle charging points, making it a living advertisement for the net-zero transition. Pepper noted that the organisation has also helped people with energy costs amid surging global gas prices.
Gesturing to the England flags dangling limply on lamp posts visible from the kitchen window, he said:
“There’s a bit of resentment around immigration and scarcity of materials and provision, so we’re trying to do our bit around community cohesion.”
This includes supper clubs and an interfaith grand iftar during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Anti-immigration sentiment in the UK has often gone hand-in-hand with opposition to climate action. Right-wing politicians and media outlets promote the idea that net-zero policies will cost people a lot of money – and these ideas have cut through with the public.
Pepper told Carbon Brief he is sympathetic to people’s worries about costs and stressed that community energy is the perfect way to win people over:
“I think the only way you can change that is if, instead of being passive consumers…communities are like us and they’re generating an income to offset that.”
From the outset, Pepper stressed that “we weren’t that concerned about climate because we had other, bigger pressures”, adding:
“But, in time, we’ve delivered climate by stealth.”
Watch, read, listen
OIL WATCH: The Guardian has published a “visual guide” with charts and videos showing how the “escalating Iran conflict is driving up oil and gas prices”.
MURDER IN HONDURAS: Ten years on from the murder of Indigenous environmental justice advocate Berta Cáceres, Drilled asked why Honduras is still so dangerous for environmental activists.
TALKING WEATHER: A new film, narrated by actor Michael Sheen and titled You Told Us To Talk About the Weather, aimed to promote conversation about climate change with a blend of “poetry, folk horror and climate storytelling”.
Coming up
- 8 March: Colombia parliamentary election
- 9-19 March: 31st Annual Session of the International Seabed Authority, Kingston, Jamaica
- 11 March: UN Environment Programme state of finance for nature 2026 report launch
Pick of the jobs
- London School of Economics and Political Science, fellow in the social science of sustainability | Salary: £43,277-£51,714. Location: London
- NORCAP, innovative climate finance expert | Salary: Unknown. Location: Kyiv, Ukraine
- WBHM, environmental reporter | Salary: $50,050-$81,330. Location: Birmingham, Alabama, US
- Climate Cabinet, data engineer | Salary: hourly rate of $60-$120 per hour. Location: Remote anywhere in the US
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
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The post DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine appeared first on Carbon Brief.
China’s leadership has published a draft of its 15th five-year plan setting the strategic direction for the nation out to 2030, including support for clean energy and energy security.
The plan sets a target to cut China’s “carbon intensity” by 17% over the five years from 2026-30, but also changes the basis for calculating this key climate metric.
The plan continues to signal support for China’s clean-energy buildout and, in general, contains no major departures from the country’s current approach to the energy transition.
The government reaffirms support for several clean-energy industries, ranging from solar and electric vehicles (EVs) through to hydrogen and “new-energy” storage.
The plan also emphasises China’s willingness to steer climate governance and be seen as a provider of “global public goods”, in the form of affordable clean-energy technologies.
However, while the document says it will “promote the peaking” of coal and oil use, it does not set out a timeline and continues to call for the “clean and efficient” use of coal.
This shows that tensions remain between China’s climate goals and its focus on energy security, leading some analysts to raise concerns about its carbon-cutting ambition.
Below, Carbon Brief outlines the key climate change and energy aspects of the plan, including targets for carbon intensity, non-fossil energy and forestry.
Note: this article is based on a draft published on 5 March and will be updated if any significant changes are made in the final version of the plan, due to be released at the close next week of the “two sessions” meeting taking place in Beijing.
- What is China’s 15th five-year plan?
- What does the plan say about China’s climate action?
- What is China’s new CO2 intensity target?
- Does the plan encourage further clean-energy additions?
- What does the plan signal about coal?
- How will China approach global climate governance in the next five years?
- What else does the plan cover?
What is China’s 15th five-year plan?
Five-year plans are one of the most important documents in China’s political system.
Addressing everything from economic strategy to climate policy, they outline the planned direction for China’s socio-economic development in a five-year period. The 15th five-year plan covers 2026-30.
These plans include several “main goals”. These are largely quantitative indicators that are seen as particularly important to achieve and which provide a foundation for subsequent policies during the five-year period.
The table below outlines some of the key “main goals” from the draft 15th five-year plan.
| Category | Indicator | Indicator in 2025 | Target by 2030 | Cumulative target over 2026-2030 | Characteristic |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Economic development | Gross domestic product (GDP) growth (%) | 5 | Maintained within a reasonable range and proposed annually as appropriate. | Anticipatory | |
| ‘Green and low-carbon | Reduction in CO2 emissions per unit of GDP (%) | 17.7 | 17 | Binding | |
| Share of non-fossil energy in total energy consumption (%) | 21.7 | 25 | Binding | ||
| Security guarantee | Comprehensive energy production capacity (100m tonnes of standard coal equivalent) |
51.3 | 58 | Binding |
Select list of targets highlighted in the “main goals” section of the draft 15th five-year plan. Source: Draft 15th five-year plan.
Since the 12th five-year plan, covering 2011-2015, these “main goals” have included energy intensity and carbon intensity as two of five key indicators for “green ecology”.
The previous five-year plan, which ran from 2021-2025, introduced the idea of an absolute “cap” on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, although it did not provide an explicit figure in the document. This has been subsequently addressed by a policy on the “dual-control of carbon” issued in 2024.
The latest plan removes the energy-intensity goal and elevates the carbon-intensity goal, but does not set an absolute cap on emissions (see below).
It covers the years until 2030, before which China has pledged to peak its carbon emissions. (Analysis for Carbon Brief found that emissions have been “flat or falling” since March 2024.)
The plans are released at the two sessions, an annual gathering of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). This year, it runs from 4-12 March.
The plans are often relatively high-level, with subsequent topic-specific five-year plans providing more concrete policy guidance.
Policymakers at the National Energy Agency (NEA) have indicated that in the coming years they will release five sector-specific plans for 2026-2030, covering topics such as the “new energy system”, electricity and renewable energy.
There may also be specific five-year plans covering carbon emissions and environmental protection, as well as the coal and nuclear sectors, according to analysts.
Other documents published during the two sessions include an annual government work report, which outlines key targets and policies for the year ahead.
The gathering is attended by thousands of deputies – delegates from across central and local governments, as well as Chinese Communist party members, members of other political parties, academics, industry leaders and other prominent figures.
What does the plan say about China’s climate action?
Achieving China’s climate targets will remain a key driver of the country’s policies in the next five years, according to the draft 15th five-year plan.
It lists the “acceleration” of China’s energy transition as a “major achievement” in the 14th five-year plan period (2021-2025), noting especially how clean-power capacity had overtaken fossil fuels.
The draft says China will “actively and steadily advance and achieve carbon peaking”, with policymakers continuing to strike a balance between building a “green economy” and ensuring stability.
Climate and environment continues to receive its own chapter in the plan. However, the framing and content of this chapter has shifted subtly compared with previous editions, as shown in the table below. For example, unlike previous plans, the first section of this chapter focuses on China’s goal to peak emissions.
| 11th five-year plan (2006-2010) | 12th five-year plan (2011-2015) | 13th five-year plan (2016-2020) | 14th five-year plan (2021-2025) | 15th five-year plan (2026-2030) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chapter title | Part 6: Build a resource-efficient and environmentally-friendly society | Part 6: Green development, building a resource-efficient and environmentally friendly society | Part 10: Ecosystems and the environment | Part 11: Promote green development and facilitate the harmonious coexistence of people and nature | Part 13: Accelerating the comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development to build a beautiful China |
| Sections | Developing a circular economy | Actively respond to global climate change | Accelerate the development of functional zones | Improve the quality and stability of ecosystems | Actively and steadily advancing and achieving carbon peaking |
| Protecting and restoring natural ecosystems | Strengthen resource conservation and management | Promote economical and intensive resource use | Continue to improve environmental quality | Continuously improving environmental quality | |
| Strengthening environmental protection | Vigorously develop the circular economy | Step up comprehensive environmental governance | Accelerate the green transformation of the development model | Enhancing the diversity, stability, and sustainability of ecosystems | |
| Enhancing resource management | Strengthen environmental protection efforts | Intensify ecological conservation and restoration | Accelerating the formation of green production and lifestyles | ||
| Rational utilisation of marine and climate resources | Promoting ecological conservation and restoration | Respond to global climate change | |||
| Strengthen the development of water conservancy and disaster prevention and mitigation systems | Improve mechanisms for ensuring ecological security | ||||
| Develop green and environmentally-friendly industries |
Title and main sections of the climate and environment-focused chapters in the last five five-year plans. Source: China’s 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th five-year plans.
The climate and environment chapter in the latest plan calls for China to “balance [economic] development and emission reduction” and “ensure the timely achievement of carbon peak targets”.
Under the plan, China will “continue to pursue” its established direction and objectives on climate, Prof Li Zheng, dean of the Tsinghua University Institute of Climate Change and Sustainable Development (ICCSD), tells Carbon Brief.
What is China’s new CO2 intensity target?
In the lead-up to the release of the plan, analysts were keenly watching for signals around China’s adoption of a system for the “dual-control of carbon”.
This would combine the existing targets for carbon intensity – the CO2 emissions per unit of GDP – with a new cap on China’s total carbon emissions. This would mark a dramatic step for the country, which has never before set itself a binding cap on total emissions.
Policymakers had said last year that this framework would come into effect during the 15th five-year plan period, replacing the previous system for the “dual-control of energy”.
However, the draft 15th five-year plan does not offer further details on when or how both parts of the dual-control of carbon system will be implemented. Instead, it continues to focus on carbon intensity targets alone.
Looking back at the previous five-year plan period, the latest document says China had achieved a carbon-intensity reduction of 17.7%, just shy of its 18% goal.
This is in contrast with calculations by Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), which had suggested that China had only cut its carbon intensity by 12% over the past five years.
At the time it was set in 2021, the 18% target had been seen as achievable, with analysts telling Carbon Brief that they expected China to realise reductions of 20% or more.
However, the government had fallen behind on meeting the target.
Last year, ecology and environment minister Huang Runqiu attributed this to the Covid-19 pandemic, extreme weather and trade tensions. He said that China, nevertheless, remained “broadly” on track to meet its 2030 international climate pledge of reducing carbon intensity by more than 65% from 2005 levels.
Myllyvirta tells Carbon Brief that the newly reported figure showing a carbon-intensity reduction of 17.7% is likely due to an “opportunistic” methodological revision. The new methodology now includes industrial process emissions – such as cement and chemicals – as well as the energy sector.
(This is not the first time China has redefined a target, with regulators changing the methodology for energy intensity in 2023.)
For the next five years, the plan sets a target to reduce carbon intensity by 17%, slightly below the previous goal.
However, the change in methodology means that this leaves space for China’s overall emissions to rise by “3-6% over the next five years”, says Myllyvirta. In contrast, he adds that the original methodology would have required a 2% fall in absolute carbon emissions by 2030.
The dashed lines in the chart below show China’s targets for reducing carbon intensity during the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th five-year periods, while the bars show what was achieved under the old (dark blue) and new (light blue) methodology.
The carbon-intensity target is the “clearest signal of Beijing’s climate ambition”, says Li Shuo, director at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s (ASPI) China climate hub.
It also links directly to China’s international pledge – made in 2021 – to cut its carbon intensity to more than 65% below 2005 levels by 2030.
To meet this pledge under the original carbon-intensity methodology, China would have needed to set a target of a 23% reduction within the 15th five-year plan period. However, the country’s more recent 2035 international climate pledge, released last year, did not include a carbon-intensity target.
As such, ASPI’s Li interprets the carbon-intensity target in the draft 15th five-year plan as a “quiet recalibration” that signals “how difficult the original 2030 goal has become”.
Furthermore, the 15th five-year plan does not set an absolute emissions cap.
This leaves “significant ambiguity” over China’s climate plans, says campaign group 350 in a press statement reacting to the draft plan. It explains:
“The plan was widely expected to mark a clearer transition from carbon-intensity targets toward absolute emissions reductions…[but instead] leaves significant ambiguity about how China will translate record renewable deployment into sustained emissions cuts.”
Myllyvirta tells Carbon Brief that this represents a “continuation” of the government’s focus on scaling up clean-energy supply while avoiding setting “strong measurable emission targets”.
He says that he would still expect to see absolute caps being set for power and industrial sectors covered by China’s emissions trading scheme (ETS). In addition, he thinks that an overall absolute emissions cap may still be published later in the five-year period.
Despite the fact that it has yet to be fully implemented, the switch from dual-control of energy to dual-control of carbon represents a “major policy evolution”, Ma Jun, director of the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE), tells Carbon Brief. He says that it will allow China to “provide more flexibility for renewable energy expansion while tightening the net on fossil-fuel reliance”.
Does the plan encourage further clean-energy additions?
“How quickly carbon intensity is reduced largely depends on how much renewable energy can be supplied,” says Yao Zhe, global policy advisor at Greenpeace East Asia, in a statement.
The five-year plan continues to call for China’s development of a “new energy system that is clean, low-carbon, safe and efficient” by 2030, with continued additions of “wind, solar, hydro and nuclear power”.
In line with China’s international pledge, it sets a target for raising the share of non-fossil energy in total energy consumption to 25% by 2030, up from just under 21.7% in 2025.
The development of “green factories” and “zero-carbon [industrial] parks” has been central to many local governments’ strategies for meeting the non-fossil energy target, according to industry news outlet BJX News. A call to build more of these zero-carbon industrial parks is listed in the five-year plan.
Prof Pan Jiahua, dean of Beijing University of Technology’s Institute of Ecological Civilization, tells Carbon Brief that expanding demand for clean energy through mechanisms such as “green factories” represents an increasingly “bottom-up” and “market-oriented” approach to the energy transition, which will leave “no place for fossil fuels”.
He adds that he is “very much sure that China’s zero-carbon process is being accelerated and fossil fuels are being driven out of the market”, pointing to the rapid adoption of EVs.
The plan says that China will aim to double “non-fossil energy” in 10 years – although it does not clarify whether this means their installed capacity or electricity generation, or what the exact starting year would be.
Research has shown that doubling wind and solar capacity in China between 2025-2035 would be “consistent” with aims to limit global warming to 2C.
While the language “certainly” pushes for greater additions of renewable energy, Yao tells Carbon Brief, it is too “opaque” to be a “direct indication” of the government’s plans for renewable additions.
She adds that “grid stability and healthy, orderly competition” is a higher priority for policymakers than guaranteeing a certain level of capacity additions.
China continues to place emphasis on the need for large-scale clean-energy “bases” and cross-regional power transmission.
The plan says China must develop “clean-energy bases…in the three northern regions” and “integrated hydro-wind-solar complexes” in south-west China.
It specifically encourages construction of “large-scale wind and solar” power bases in desert regions “primarily” for cross-regional power transmission, as well as “major hydropower” projects, including the Yarlung Tsangpo dam in Tibet.
As such, the country should construct “power-transmission corridors” with the capacity to send 420 gigawatts (GW) of electricity from clean-energy bases in western provinces to energy-hungry eastern provinces by 2030, the plan says.
State Grid, China’s largest grid operator, plans to install “another 15 ultra-high voltage [UHV] transmission lines” by 2030, reports Reuters, up from the 45 UHV lines built by last year.
Below are two maps illustrating the interlinkages between clean-energy bases in China in the 15th (top) and 14th (bottom) five-year plan periods.
The yellow dotted areas represent clean energy bases, while the arrows represent cross-regional power transmission. The blue wind-turbine icons represent offshore windfarms and the red cooling tower icons represent coastal nuclear plants.
The 15th five-year plan map shows a consistent approach to the 2021-2025 period. As well as power being transmitted from west to east, China plans for more power to be sent to southern provinces from clean-energy bases in the north-west, while clean-energy bases in the north-east supply China’s eastern coast.
It also maps out “mutual assistance” schemes for power grids in neighbouring provinces.
Offshore wind power should reach 100GW by 2030, while nuclear power should rise to 110GW, according to the plan.
What does the plan signal about coal?
The increased emphasis on grid infrastructure in the draft 15th five-year plan reflects growing concerns from energy planning officials around ensuring China’s energy supply.
Ren Yuzhi, director of the NEA’s development and planning department, wrote ahead of the plan’s release that the “continuous expansion” of China’s energy system has “dramatically increased its complexity”.
He said the NEA felt there was an “urgent need” to enhance the “secure and reliable” replacement of fossil-fuel power with new energy sources, as well as to ensure the system’s “ability to absorb them”.
Meanwhile, broader concerns around energy security have heightened calls for coal capacity to remain in the system as a “ballast stone”.
The plan continues to support the “clean and efficient utilisation of fossil fuels” and does not mention either a cap or peaking timeline for coal consumption.
Xi had previously told fellow world leaders that China would “strictly control” coal-fired power and phase down coal consumption in the 15th five-year plan period.
The “geopolitical situation is increasing energy security concerns” at all levels of government, said the Institute for Global Decarbonization Progress in a note responding to the draft plan, adding that this was creating “uncertainty over coal reduction”.
Ahead of its publication, there were questions around whether the plan would set a peaking deadline for oil and coal. An article posted by state news agency Xinhua last month, examining recommendations for the plan from top policymakers, stated that coal consumption would plateau from “around 2027”, while oil would peak “around 2026”.
However, the plan does not lay out exact years by which the two fossil fuels should peak, only saying that China will “promote the peaking of coal and oil consumption”.
There are similarly no mentions of phasing out coal in general, in line with existing policy.
Nevertheless, there is a heavy emphasis on retrofitting coal-fired power plants. The plan calls for the establishment of “demonstration projects” for coal-plant retrofitting, such as through co-firing with biomass or “green ammonia”.
Such retrofitting could incentivise lower utilisation of coal plants – and thus lower emissions – if they are used to flexibly meet peaks in demand and to cover gaps in clean-energy output, instead of providing a steady and significant share of generation.
The plan also calls for officials to “fully implement low-carbon retrofitting projects for coal-chemical industries”, which have been a notable source of emissions growth in the past year.
However, the coal-chemicals sector will likely remain a key source of demand for China’s coal mining industry, with coal-to-oil and coal-to-gas bases listed as a “key area” for enhancing the country’s “security capabilities”.
Meanwhile, coal-fired boilers and industrial kilns in the paper industry, food processing and textiles should be replaced with “clean” alternatives to the equivalent of 30m tonnes of coal consumption per year, it says.
“China continues to scale up clean energy at an extraordinary pace, but the plan still avoids committing to strong measurable constraints on emissions or fossil fuel use”, says Joseph Dellatte, head of energy and climate studies at the Institut Montaigne. He adds:
“The logic remains supply-driven: deploy massive amounts of clean energy and assume emissions will eventually decline.”
How will China approach global climate governance in the next five years?
Meanwhile, clean-energy technologies continue to play a role in upgrading China’s economy, with several “new energy” sectors listed as key to its industrial policy.
Named sectors include smart EVs, “new solar cells”, new-energy storage, hydrogen and nuclear fusion energy.
“China’s clean-technology development – rather than traditional administrative climate controls – is increasingly becoming the primary driver of emissions reduction,” says ASPI’s Li. He adds that strengthening China’s clean-energy sectors means “more closely aligning Beijing’s economic ambitions with its climate objectives”.
Analysis for Carbon Brief shows that clean energy drove more than a third of China’s GDP growth in 2025, representing around 11% of China’s whole economy.
The continued support for these sectors in the draft five-year plan comes as the EU outlined its own measures intended to limit China’s hold on clean-energy industries, driven by accusations of “unfair competition” from Chinese firms.
China is unlikely to crack down on clean-tech production capacity, Dr Rebecca Nadin, director of the Centre for Geopolitics of Change at ODI Global, tells Carbon Brief. She says:
“Beijing is treating overcapacity in solar and smart EVs as a strategic choice, not a policy error…and is prepared to pour investment into these sectors to cement global market share, jobs and technological leverage.”
Dellatte echoes these comments, noting that it is “striking” that the plan “barely addresses the issue of industrial overcapacity in clean technologies”, with the focus firmly on “scaling production and deployment”.
At the same time, China is actively positioning itself to be a prominent voice in climate diplomacy and a champion of proactive climate action.
This is clear from the first line in a section on providing “global public goods”. It says:
“As a responsible major country, China will play a more active role in addressing global challenges such as climate change.”
The plan notes that China will “actively participate in and steer [引领] global climate governance”, in line with the principle of “common,but differentiated responsibilities”.
This echoes similar language from last year’s government work report, Yao tells Carbon Brief, demonstrating a “clear willingness” to guide global negotiations. But she notes that this “remains an aspiration that’s yet to be made concrete”. She adds:
“China has always favored collective leadership, so its vision of leadership is never a lone one.”
The country will “deepen south-south cooperation on climate change”, the plan says. In an earlier section on “opening up”, it also notes that China will explore “new avenues for collaboration in green development” with global partners as part of its “Belt and Road Initiative”.
China is “doubling down” on a narrative that it is a “responsible major power” and “champion of south-south climate cooperation”, Nadin says, such as by “presenting its clean‑tech exports and finance as global public goods”. She says:
“China will arrive at future COPs casting itself as the indispensable climate leader for the global south…even though its new five‑year plan still puts growth, energy security and coal ahead of faster emissions cuts at home.”
What else does the plan cover?
The impact of extreme weather – particularly floods – remains a key concern in the plan.
China must “refine” its climate adaptation framework and “enhance its resilience to climate change, particularly extreme-weather events”, it says.
China also aims to “strengthen construction of a national water network” over the next five years in order to help prevent floods and droughts.
An article published a few days before the plan in the state-run newspaper China Daily noted that, “as global warming intensifies, extreme weather events – including torrential rains, severe convective storms, and typhoons – have become more frequent, widespread and severe”.
The plan also touches on critical minerals used for low-carbon technologies. These will likely remain a geopolitical flashpoint, with China saying it will focus during the next five years on “intensifying” exploration and “establishing” a reserve for critical minerals. This reserve will focus on “scarce” energy minerals and critical minerals, as well as other “advantageous mineral resources”.
Dellatte says that this could mean the “competition in the energy transition will increasingly be about control over mineral supply chains”.
Other low-carbon policies listed in the five-year plan include expanding coverage of China’s mandatory carbon market and further developing its voluntary carbon market.
China will “strengthen monitoring and control” of non-CO2 greenhouse gases, the plan says, as well as implementing projects “targeting methane, nitrous oxide and hydrofluorocarbons” in sectors such as coal mining, agriculture and chemicals.
This will create “capacity” for reducing emissions by 30m tonnes of CO2 equivalent, it adds.
Meanwhile, China will develop rules for carbon footprint accounting and push for internationally recognised accounting standards.
It will enhance reform of power markets over the next five years and improve the trading mechanism for green electricity certificates.
It will also “promote” adoption of low-carbon lifestyles and decarbonisation of transport, as well as working to advance electrification of freight and shipping.
The post Q&A: What does China’s 15th ‘five-year plan’ mean for climate change? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Q&A: What does China’s 15th ‘five-year plan’ mean for climate change?
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