China, the greatest fossil fuel economy the world had ever seen, was committing itself to the end of the carbon age within forty years. Behind the scenes, the step had been prepared by a team of climate scientists at the elite Tsinghua University led by veteran climate negotiator Xie Zhenhua.4 Beijing had dropped hints in talks with the EU over the summer, but Xi’s announcement on September 22 came as a surprise. It was disorienting. Climate policy advocates, both in Europe and around the Biden campaign in the United States, had always assumed that they would have to bargain China into a bold
...more
