China’s climate confidence trick

Moreover, the minerals crucial to EV production are mined by China with little or no environmental or human rights concerns. The lithium-ion batteries used in EVs are primarily composed of cobalt, lithium, manganese, and graphite, which are mined in developing countries. For instance, the Democratic Republic of Congo provides about two thirds of the global output of cobalt. Congolese mines are controlled by Chinese companies which employ child labour in extremely dangerous conditions. For more details on these issues, see "Wind and Solar are the Most Environmentally Destructive Energy Sources" that Dr. Jay Lehr and I wrote in 2021.

China has agreed to create an updated supply mechanism for their exports of critical minerals, which is further concerning due to their poor standards in mineral extraction. Even in their domestic EV production, the EU relies on these minerals from China, and so continued dependence on China's minerals will only worsen human rights and environmental abuses.

To understand how China gets away with all this we need to examine the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which is the governing document for all UN climate agreements, including the Paris Agreement. Article 4 of the UNFCCC states that the first and overriding priority of developing nations is poverty alleviation and development. Since China is still considered a developing nation under the UN's climate agreements, and burning coal is the cheapest way to continue to pull their people out of poverty, China will burn all the coal it wants indefinitely as it has full rein to soar past its Paris Agreement target to cap emissions by 2030.

When Xie Zhenhua, the Chinese climate negotiator at COP 20 in Lima, Peru (2014), was asked about China's exemption from binding emissions reductions under Article 4 of the UNFCCC, he simply pointed to the article and said:

"We are exempt. We are a developing country."

He then explained that the purpose of the Paris Agreement, then under development, was to enforce the UNFCCC, not to replace or change it.

So China knows it has a sweetheart deal-they can expand their coal usage, build coal stations across the world and grow their emissions without limit while boasting that they are following international climate agreements. All the while, they make a fortune selling wind and solar power equipment and batteries to western nations riddled with guilt over our own emissions that we falsely believe are damaging the climate.

China's climate strategy is a strategically brilliant confidence trick-an elaborate balancing act in which the country presents itself as a global leader in clean technology, while approving and constructing coal-fired power plants at a staggering pace. It's high time we called them on this.