China Can Achieve Carbon Neutrality in Line with the Paris Agreement’s 2 °C Target: Navigating Global Emissions Scenarios, Warming Levels, and Extreme Event Projections

Abstract

This paper proposes that China, under the challenge of balancing its development and security, can aim for the Paris Agreement’s goal to limit global warming to no more than 2 °C by actively seeking carbon-peak and carbon-neutrality pathways that align with China’s national conditions, rather than following the idealized path toward the 1.5 °C target by initially relying on extensive negative-emission technologies such as direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS). This work suggests that pursuing a 1.5 °C target is increasingly less feasible for China, as it would potentially incur 3–4 times the cost of pursuing the 2 °C target. With China being likely to achieve a peak in its emissions around 2028, at about 12.8 billion tonnes of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO₂), and become carbon neutral, projected global warming levels may be less severe after the 2050s than previously estimated. This could reduce the risk potential of climate tipping points and extreme events, especially considering that the other two major carbon emitters in the world (Europe and North America) have already passed their carbon peaks. While natural carbon sinks will contribute to China’s carbon neutrality efforts, they are not expected to be decisive in the transition stages. This research also addresses the growing focus on climate overshoot, tipping points, extreme events, loss and damage, and methane reductions in international climate cooperation, emphasizing the need to balance these issues with China’s development, security, and fairness considerations. China’s pursuit of carbon neutrality will have significant implications for global emissions scenarios, warming levels, and extreme event projections, as well as for climate change hotspots of international concern, such as climate tipping points, the climate crisis, and the notion that the world has moved from a warming to a boiling era. Possible research recommendations for global emissions scenarios based on China’s 2 °C target pathway are also summarized.