(EnergyAsia, April 2, Wednesday) — The US and China must make accommodations to curb greenhouse gas emissions if both countries are to break their “suicide pact” of self-destructive, energy-using behaviour, said the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Together, the two countries produce 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Yet both demand that the other take responsibility for climate change, meanwhile the threat of environmental disaster grows.

But for the first time, China is considering an emissions target while half of US states have set their own targets—the time for a deal is now.

In a special report, “Breaking the Suicide Pact: U.S.-China Cooperation on Climate Change,” William Chandler, director of the Carnegie Energy and Climate Program, identifies practical, non treaty-based approaches both countries could take to cut their carbon dioxide emissions across economic sectors—with little financial impact.

He argues that China and the US should work together to set individual, national goals and achieve them through domestically enforceable measures and international agreements that prevent either nation from taking advantage of steps taken by the other.

His key recommendations for US-China cooperation include:

• Eliminating subsidies that discourage energy efficiency.
• Providing tax breaks for investment in efficiency and low-carbon energy and impose tax penalties on high-carbon energy.
• Making climate cooperation integral to trade policy, such as jointly setting production standards to limit the energy used to manufacture exports. 
• Creating partnerships between Chinese provincial officials and leaders in US states on the forefront of climate change prevention to improve implementation of innovative energy policies.
• Promoting market penetration of existing carbon emission reduction technologies and encourage development of new technologies by linking American laboratories more closely to Chinese markets to share research and development costs.
• Encouraging banks in China to remove the regulatory cap on interest rates for energy-efficiency investments.

“US–China collaboration poses no threat to the climate leadership of any region or nation or to global cooperation. It is a complement, not a challenge, to existing and planned emissions cap and trade systems. This act of mutual self-preservation would help the US and China to avert climate disaster and the eventual sanctions of other nations if they do not act, and lay the groundwork for successful global action,” said Mr Chandler.

Mr Chandler has spent over 35 years working in energy and environmental policy and was a lead author for the Nobel Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He is president of Transition Energy, co-founder of DEED China, a joint venture building waste heat recovery power plants in China, co-founder of the Moscow-based Center for Energy Efficiency, and founder and former director of Advanced International Studies at the Joint Global Change Research Institute.

The Carnegie Energy and Climate Program aims to provide leadership in global energy and climate policy. It integrates thinking on energy technology, environmental science, and political economy to reduce risks stemming from global change and competition for scarce resources.