Six Things the Climate Movement Gets Wrong About China
The China conversation we all keep dodging
By Seaver Wang
The biggest storylines about climate and clean energy right now are in China. Amid a flood of depressing news elsewhere, record-breaking deployments of wind, solar, batteries, electric vehicles, and even nuclear power in China offer a rare spot of hope for clean energy sector observers and advocates of climate action.
Such justifiable excitement about clean energy progress in China isn’t just driven by large numbers but also by undeniable advances in technology—successively better battery performance, larger wind turbines, higher solar module performance, and promising announcements about the commercialization of new sodium-ion batteries and next-generation solar cells. In a land bursting with eye-popping statistics—both optimistic and pessimistic—everyone can find what they’re looking for in a China narrative. Public intellectuals, policy elites, and a global climate movement all increasingly adrift in an era of surging right-wing populism have thus seized upon a China-led clean energy revolution as a “last, best” hope for setting the world back on the right track.
Yet in practice, the idea that China’s clean technology successes have uncovered a more hopeful recipe for climate salvation is wrong. Trends in China offer great promise but also formidable obstacles to decarbonization, echoing how the best-case low-warming climate outcomes that many vaguely desire have no path to realization. At the same time, China’s repressive governance and opaque capitalism pose genuine challenges to achieving a more fair and just energy transition.
Ultimately, China’s policies are arguably aiming for a world with 2-3 degrees C of global warming in which Chinese industries dominate advanced technologies across the energy sector and beyond. While many implicitly utilitarian climate thinkers have embraced China as the global manufacturer of solar and battery equipment, it is hard to imagine a mainstream climate organization that would actually declare a 2-3C future to be a victory.
In other words, the climate movement gains nothing from holding its nose and abandoning its professed values to indiscriminately gobble Chinese solar panels and electric vehicles. Continued efforts by climate advocates to browbeat China, the U.S., Russia, and developing nations like India or Indonesia, towards lower-warming pathways well below 2C face both dubious odds and also require crucial recognition that China poses more obstacles than it offers solutions. More realistically, if the world is likely trending towards 2-3C of warming, then discussion on China’s role in the climate transition must rightfully refocus on ensuring better, fairer outcomes for people globally now and in the future.
Here are six key reasons why conversations on China and climate must get more serious:
1. Global lethargy and concentration of clean technology supply chains in China now make 1.5C impossible, justly or not.
The climate movement has regularly called for global cooperation to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius or less by the year 2100. Recognizing that such an ambitious effort could manifest problematically, climate advocates and policymakers have also demanded a just climate transition “that leaves no one behind.”
The 1.5C goal is no longer realistic for the world we live in. Counting from early 2025, human CO2 emissions cannot exceed 130 billion tons while maintaining a coins-flip chance of keeping warming to 1.5C or less. The world emitted about 38 billion tons of CO2 from fossil fuels and industrial processes in 2023. China’s national emissions alone—even if they linearly declined from 11.9 billion tons in 2023 to zero by 2060 in an ambitious execution of the Chinese government’s current commitments—would consume this remaining allowance by the end of 2039. Barring remarkable luck with a mild climate response to greenhouse gases or large-scale human-led geoengineering or carbon removal, the specific climate target of 1.5C is no longer attainable.
The next most preferable outcome for the climate movement might be the next most rapid possible shift away from fossil fuels, ideally without imposing disproportionate harms on any group of people. Here too, the current global state of play forces difficult dilemmas upon supporters of clean energy and climate efforts. Concentration of unethical clean technology supply chains in opaque Chinese industrial networks now forces environmentalists to balance tradeoffs between the fastest CO2 cuts possible versus careful enforcement of social accountability—all while navigating difficult geopolitical tensions.
2. Chinese industrial might is holding back climate progress in key sectors even while rapidly advancing progress in others.
Chinese government policies and industry efforts are unquestionably helping establish solar and wind energy, batteries, and electric vehicles as widely-available technologies and fundamental tools for designing the electricity and transportation sectors of the future. At the same time, other areas across China’s industrial sector pose significant obstacles to global decarbonization. From steel, aluminum, and glass to more obscure products like battery graphite, calcium carbide, and PVC, Chinese mass production leveraging cheap coal energy has discouraged the pursuit of alternative approaches, both within and outside China.
These upstream raw material incumbencies have in turn made it harder for other countries to establish their own solar and battery manufacturing or justify the business case for cleaner metallurgical plants, impeding the spread of mass production knowledge in downstream clean technology sectors. Aggressive Chinese mercantilism and export controls on know-how like battery and graphite manufacturing processes are similarly slowing such technological dissemination.
These challenges are hardly insurmountable, and next-generation R&D, policy changes, and continued clean energy efforts in China or beyond may well resolve them long-term. But for now, these heavy industry and manufacturing tensions continue to color how countries are negotiating with China on both climate and trade issues. In China, all the biggest numbers are true at once, for both low-carbon and carbon intensive technologies and industries. It remains important to keep a broader perspective rather than over-index on developments in solar panels or electric vehicles.
3. The idea that climate partnership can defuse tensions between China, the United States, and other countries has always been fantasy.
For many years, activists, academics, and statesmen around the world have hoped that joint efforts on a shared problem like climate change might soften mounting tensions between China and the United States. Yet the theory that climate partnership might defuse the U.S.-China rivalry never passed muster to begin with. An essay last year from political scientist Michael Mazarr ruminated over the set of ways that great power rivalries like that between the U.S. and China have historically resolved: war, political instability or revolution, subordination, or strategic realignment. Mazarr himself expresses the hope that realignment in response to a greater environmental threat could encourage both sides to move past rivalry.
But today it is ridiculous to even imagine Trump’s America extending an olive branch to Beijing via climate cooperation. At the same time, China’s underwhelming new climate commitments and the previously mentioned carbon math indicate that Chinese policymakers have no intent of chasing anything close to the 1.5C target and are continuing to prioritize growth over rapid decarbonization. And while Trump-bashing may be in fashion, the more sobering realization is that neither a different U.S. government nor for that matter the Chinese government are likely to consider climate change a sufficiently existential threat to compel U.S.-China cooperation. Both Chinese and American policymakers probably feel confident about their country’s ability to endure even moderate global warming. Long-term national infrastructure efforts in China—including the South-to-North Water Diversion Project and “Great Green Wall” of vegetation aimed to fortify northern deserts against expansion—indicate a certain faith in climate adaptation in Beijing. Relative to natural disasters and heatwaves, the Chinese and U.S. governments likely see the chaos of potential economic or military conflict as far greater stakes.
The current moment demands not a futile hope for friendlier global relations that could enable climate action but rather a resilient climate theory of change that can survive unfriendly relations. Longtime China climate policy observer Lauri Myllyivirta wrote years ago that competition itself could help drive clean technologies and related policy support forward faster. Indeed, insofar as U.S. NGO and industry groups were modestly successful in saving some U.S. national energy innovation subsidies this year, arguments on the basis of competition with China played a major role in that outcome. This atmosphere of geopolitical rivalry is far from the best of possible worlds, but it is not going anywhere soon.
4. Given the geopolitical stakes of mastering the future energy system, technological and industrial competition is inevitable
Many fervently believe that solar power and battery technology will remake the world, only to react with dismay when countries initiate trade disputes over said world-changing technologies. Affordable energy greatly strengthens the competitiveness of a country’s advanced industries and general economic activities. The challenge the clean energy transition poses heavily revolves around the question of how governments can maintain or improve their economic position both during the transition itself and in an envisioned clean energy future.
The ability to manufacture solar polysilicon or battery chemicals not only confers mastery over key energy system tools, but promises to unlock other benefits in sectors like semiconductor chip manufacturing and military drones which rely on related industrial techniques like chemical vapor deposition and battery cell assembly. Meanwhile, the passenger automobile industry has historically enjoyed strong state support and protection worldwide out of recognition of its economic weight, job creation capability, and spillover technological benefits across manufacturing areas. At the same time, electric vehicles offer many adopting countries the alluring possibility of alleviating oil import dependence.
Governments’ aggressive protection and fostering of their own budding clean technology sectors and control of relevant intellectual property thus possess many rational justifications. The practical conclusion to draw from such dynamics is that climate efforts will have to advance amid and despite mercantilist strategic maneuvering, rather than hoping in vain for altruistic cooperation.
5. Opaque Chinese supply chains profoundly challenge “supply chain justice” for clean energy and vehicle technologies.
Environmental groups are gravely mistaken if they believe they can promote better mining, refining, and manufacturing of renewables and electric vehicles while ignoring the elephant in the room. Globally, many unethical supply chains leverage China as their chief refuge from accountability.
Chinese electric vehicle and wind turbine magnetic drives use rare earth ores from war-torn Myanmar. Labor rights watchdogs have called out abuse of overseas Chinese workers from nickel refineries in Indonesia to a BYD factory project in Brazil. Allegations of state-sponsored Uyghur forced labor program participation have plagued solar polysilicon, metallurgical silicon, and aluminum production in Xinjiang alongside broader scrutiny of the region’s agricultural, textile, and industrial sectors. While many clean energy commentators have come to ape Chinese government spokespeople in rolling their eyes at forced labor risks, a wealth of broader reporting highlights broader labor abuse problems in China including coercive exploitation of North Korean migrant workers in Northeastern China in industries like construction, garments, seafood, and electronics. Where a mine collapse in Canada or Poland killing 40 workers would dominate national headlines for weeks, mine and industrial accidents of such scale in China rapidly fade into media obscurity.
Climate activists must insist on good environmental and social practices not just for lithium mining or alumina processing in Chile or Brazil but also in China. Instead, dedicated research on supply chain environmental and social justice concerns often implicitly or even explicitly declines to explore Chinese case studies. Such selective silence only promotes continued development of supply chains running through China, safe from most NGO criticism. Certainly if the environmental community is shunning Teslas out of disagreement with Elon Musk’s politics or demanding rigorous tracking and accountability for battery cobalt sourced from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, then climate efforts should similarly scrutinize Chinese supply chains. Abusive labor practices and forced labor are simply unacceptable; solar panels or electric vehicles are no exception.
Of course, the factory best able to produce clean technologies today is the one already operating. The goal of policies should not solely be to exclude unethical production from the market without trying to compel changes to those companies’ practices. The aim should be to establish standards for responsible sourcing that offer a path to compliance. At the same time, such efforts require the credible resolve to walk away and source from alternative suppliers if problematic manufacturers refuse to comply.
6. The world cannot put most of its clean technology eggs in a single basket held by one country.
In general, the world must establish responsible, competitive, alternative clean technology production. Firstly, this is vital for credible progress towards supply chain justice as stated above. Secondly, globally diversified clean technology supply chains reduce the exposure of decarbonization efforts to economic, disaster, and geopolitical risks. Thirdly, greater global distribution of clean technology innovation and manufacturing disseminates expertise and problem-solving efforts, likely strengthening the energy transition overall.
Given that efforts to contain climate change are important, continued concentration of over 95 percent of global solar wafer manufacturing, 90 percent of global battery cell manufacturing, and over 90 percent of global permanent magnet manufacturing in one country is a reckless gamble. Such supply chain control by one country also gives pause to other nations planning their future energy policies. The process of substituting a region’s energy system towards clean energy sources is delicate, and governments must contemplate the risk that supply chain disruptions could leave them stranded midway and exposed to factors like high natural gas prices that may coincide with trade volatility. Essentially, policymakers must consider their “transition security.”
Ultimately, a world where manufacturing of solar panels, electric vehicles, and hydrogen electrolyzers is widely distributed and progressing globally is a sign of a healthy energy transition. If such technologies cannot be produced profitably outside of a single country, that indicates either significant distortions or the need for further effort and progress.
The moral arc of the energy transition
The common thread linking these points is that modern China poses more difficult questions regarding how to solve the climate challenge than it answers.
Awe at the scale of Chinese clean technology manufacturing and deployment perhaps heavily reflects the struggles dogging decarbonization efforts globally. Long-championed climate goals have slipped beyond reach. We can now argue over the extent solar will revolutionize electricity generation but few can entertain illusions that green fertilizers or plastics are already at hand. One country has mastered the slicing of solar wafers but the rest of the world struggles to follow suit. Geopolitical tensions and conflicts have reintensified with a vengeance, threatening fragile technology supply chains.
And while activists might dream of the authority to order rooftops covered with solar panels, such fantasies skip over the problem of damming the Grand Canyon for hydropower, or carving a pit out of a pristine Scandinavian fjord for copper. Clearly, most environmentalists and decision-makers are not ruthless utilitarians and do care about fairness and conscientiousness.
In the absence of a free civil society within China, academics, national governments, and even some environmental organizations do help advance progress by providing critical feedback on China’s energy and environmental policies and using research to pressure Chinese elites. But this China policy ecosystem also needs a parallel coalition of advocates working at a greater distance to hold Chinese industry and the state accountable for pollution, labor injustices, and human rights violations. A just climate transition that tries to awkwardly ignore the very heart of global clean technology supply chains will inevitably fail.
In the end, people globally are not striving narrowly for gigawatts of wind and solar deployed by 2030, for tons of CO2 emitted annually by 2050, or even for degrees of total warming by 2100. The ultimate goal of climate change mitigation is to achieve the best possible human future, ideally one that is fair, just, free, and prosperous. This requires balancing the recognition that any autocratic governments prioritizing unchallenged rule stand clearly opposed to the spirit of that endeavor.