Photo: Xinhua

The State Council, China's cabinet, issued a circular on Monday calling for the establishment of a sound economic system featuring green, low-carbon development, aiming to achieve nationally determined contribution targets, for CO2 emissions to peak before 2030 and to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.

As a short-term goal, production, circulation and consumption systems featuring green, low-carbon development should have taken shape by 2025 and industrial structure, energy structure and transportation structure will have been significantly optimized with a greater proportion of green industries, read the circular.

For a longer-term goal, by 2035 the scale of green industry should reach a new level, the energy resource utilization efficiency of key industries and key products should reach the international advanced level, and green production and lifestyles will be widely seen. The ecological environment will have fundamentally improved, and the goal of building a Beautiful China will have basically been achieved.

The need for renewable energies - including wind power, photovoltaic power, hydropower, geothermal energy, ocean energy, biomass energy, and solar thermal power - was also stressed.

International cooperation on green standards should be strengthened, and China will actively lead and participate in the formulation of relevant international standards to promote conformity assessment cooperation and mutual recognition mechanisms, read the circular. 

Cooperation on a green Belt and Road Initiative should be deepened and expanded, involving technical equipment and services in the fields of energy conservation, environmental protection and clean energy.

In 2019, clean energy (natural gas, hydropower, nuclear power and wind power) accounted for 23.4 percent of China's total energy consumption, up 8.9 percentage points over 2012, preliminary calculations showed.

"China reached the target of raising the share of non-fossil energy to 15 percent in total energy consumption by 2020," said the white paper titled "Energy in China's New Era" which was issued in December. 

As the world's largest energy producer and consumer, China has been working on all fronts to reform the ways energy is consumed, to build a clean and diversified energy supply system, to implement an innovation-driven energy strategy, to further the reform of the energy system, and to enhance international energy cooperation.

Global Times