Emissions of carbon dioxide in China have dropped for the first time since the lockdown in early 2020, a signal that the troubles in the property sector and energy shortages have dented industrial demand in the world’s second-largest economy, reports the Financial Times. Emissions declined by about 0.5% in the three months to the end of September, according to data published by Carbon Brief, a climate research and news service.
“The reasons [for the decline] are the clampdown on runaway real estate lending, resulting in a sharp reduction in steel and cement output, and the sky-high coal prices,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, an analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, an independent research group based in Helsinki.
However, Myllyvirta also believes the latest drop in emissions in the world’s largest polluter “could mark a turning point and an early peak in China’s emissions”—years before Beijing’s target of 2030.
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