MIN, ZHANG / JIALUO, GONG
As the two major international players in mitigating global climate change, China and the EU are at different stages of economic development, with different political systems and different social governance. However, both sides are active actors in the global response to climate change. China and the European Community (the predecessor of the European Union) are the founding members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the implementing countries of the Kyoto Protocol and the promoters of the Paris Agreement. Since the establishment of the EU and China Partnership on Climate Change Partnership in 2005, the two sides have carried out a series of fruitful cooperation in the field of climate change and played an active role in global climate governance. In 2020, China EU climate change cooperation will be affected by many factors, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the European Green Deal. The impact of the Pandemic is temporary. After returning to normal situation, EU and China cooperation on climate change will remain a key area of China-EU relations. Currently, what deserves more attention is climate neutrality proposed by the European Green deal that will have an impact on EU-China cooperation on climate change for the medium and long run. Will the EU adopt EU standards to require China to reduce emissions for achieving climate neutrality by 2050? If so, China's energy production and consumption structure will have to be significantly adjusted. To what extent can China rapidly reduce coal mining or utilization? Or adopt more advanced clean coal technology, which brings new opportunities for China and the EU to deepen cooperation on low-carbon technologies?
