…but still emits more and more greenhouse gas year over year thanks to increased reliance on coal energy.
For being the world’s factory they sure do a great job, plus what this implies is that by 2030 (the previous estimate, now 2025), they could power themselves using green energy. The coal extraction is probably to sell to countries like Germany, who closed nuclear plants and stop buying Russian gas and are now back using coal. Good job, Ewwrope.
China made a smart decision decades ago to massively ramp up investment in technologies related to sustainable energy. For example they are now by far the largest producer of refined rare earth metals and other green minerals. That decision today seems prescient.
The problem is that their environmental record is spotty at best. The metals they produce are extracted and processed as cheaply as possible, mainly to undercut competition. There is a considerable negative environmental impact to doing so with which they will one day have to reckon.
