China has been catching a lot of flak for not announcing more ambitious targets at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow: and for helping, along with India, to water down the language of the final text on coal.
Wednesday’s surprise joint Sino-U.S. declaration on climate cooperation—although noticeably light on detailed new commitments—is a hopeful sign, especially ahead of a probable virtual bilateral meeting between President Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in the coming days. But China’s climate-policy dilemma remains especially large, and is also bound up with some of its largest security vulnerabilities.
