ENERGY TRANSITION IN CHINA

As the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, China’s climate policy has a huge impact on our planet, yet the institutional and legal capacities to face the challenge of climate change need to be strengthened on multiple levels of government. Since the energy sector is the main source of man-made emissions, a successful energy transition is key for combating climate change. Therefore, energy topics have long been an integral part of Sino-German cooperation on climate change, which GIZ has been implementing on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment under its International Climate Initiative (IKI) since 2011. On the Chinese side, the project partnered with the National Energy Administration (NEA) to work on energy topics.

The Sino-German Climate Partnership, which went into its 4^th phase in 2020, is implemented by GIZ and supports China in improving its climate governance and contributes to ambitious greenhouse gas reductions. The energy activities within the Climate Partnership focus on policy analysis and advice on policies promoting emission reductions in the energy sector. A particular focus of activities so far has been the low-carbon energy transition in cities and integrated climate and energy concepts. Another important topic is the reduction of coal consumption in China.

Cities, as main energy consumers, play an important role in driving the energy transition. Cities and urban conurbations account for about 70% of the final energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions worldwide and are therefore at the center of the global energy transition. Whilst ca. 55% of the Chinese population live in cities at this time, the degree of urbanisation is expected to rise to 70% by 2030. Promoting the urban low-carbon energy transformation is therefore an important issue in China.