Rapid increases in the deployment of solar and wind power generation – which grew by 46% and 11% respectively in the third quarter of this year – meant China’s energy sector emissions remained flat, even as the demand for electricity increased.

Despite the delusions of some here on OLO, one of the world's big polluters is taking carbon dioxide emissions seriously.

Evidence?

But if flat emissions is proof that they are "taking carbon dioxide emissions seriously" then the USA must be the serious-est nation on earth given that their emissions have fallen by 30% in the past two decades despite and increasing population and massively increasing national production.

mhaze states: "then the USA must be the seriousest nation on earth."

Who knows - maybe they are or were. That might not be the case if the current president continues to have his way with renewables.

The biggest cuts to U.S. emissions has been associated with electricity produced by burning coal. Down from 2016 TWh in 2007 to 675 TWh in 2023.

This has been the result of the use of both natural gas and renewables.

In most of the Great Plains states renewables now account for at least 30% of their power. This bodes well for the future as most coal production on federal land is west of the Mississippi River and coal production peaked in 2008.

Some people say emissions have dropped; other people say that have not or they are actually increasing.

It makes no difference one way or the other.

Climate change cannot be stopped.

All this faffing around by people who think that they can change the climate is just making people poorer.

79% of Australian want cheaper power, not a reduction in emissions - especially not thec piss farting level of our country's emissions.

The most dangerous emissions are those coming from the mouths - or is it the arseholes - of loonies like Chris Bowen and anonymous nutters here passing on crap from other nutters.

Come on, mhaze. This isn't your first round with WTF.

You've seen plenty of evidence posted before. So let's not pretend this is an honest inquiry.

The data isn't hard to find. CREA and Carbon Brief have both published detailed analyses over the past year showing that China's CO2 emissions have flattened or declined, even as electricity demand rose. That's because of a record-breaking rollout of solar, wind, EVs, batteries, and grid upgrades - in many cases, outpacing the rest of the world combined.

You know the data exists. You only ask as though it doesn't to set the tone for what you know you're going to do once it's presented:

- Ignore key stats
- Highlight a caveat as if it's a contradiction
- Accuse others of distortion while subtly shifting your own position

This leaves the people you're really speaking to (i.e. your audience) confused or unsure of who's right - which is usually enough for your purposes. After all, creating a sense of uncertainty where there is none is the best denialism can hope for. Anything more than that is a bonus.

So here you are again - confidently declaring there's no evidence, before anyone even posts any. That confidence only makes sense if you're planning to twist whatever is posted anyway.

For the data presented to you in this particular case, you're going to:

- ignore the clear trendlines,
- cherry-pick lagging sectors or caveats,
- act as if any admission of nuance discredits the whole picture,
- then re-frame your opponent's engagement with the nuance as flailing, and their willingness to discuss it as desperation.

That said, your point about US emissions falling by approximately 30% since 2005 is valid. No one's denying that. It's just not the gotcha you think it is, because both the US and China have been trending in the right direction - albeit via very different mechanisms.

The fact that China has halted the relentless growth in emissions, while still growing its economy and energy use, is not trivial. It deserves to be acknowledged, not dismissed with a rhetorical shrug.

Cherrypicking is the hallmark of climate change alarmists, and this is yet more cherrypicking. China's growth emissions varies from year to year, going into reverse frequently, as you can see from this series of graphs https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china.

That having been said, if it is topping out, according to IEA projections, at this stage of the game that topping out is most likely to be caused by increasing amounts of nuclear and gas,but they'll still be emitting huge amounts of CO2 even by 2040 hhttps://www.researchgate.net/publication/346279197/figure/fig1/AS:961925106126862@1606352225952/Projected-China-electricity-generation-by-source-EIA-Source-US-Energy-Information.png when coal is projected to be 47% of the energy generation mix.

The coal-fired power stations they are building at the moment have a 40 to 70 year life span. They know renewables are only ever going to be an occasional supporting act.