China emits a third of global CO2 and exports emission savings the size of France
The role that China is playing in the transformation of the global economy is much greater than you think, with a direct impact on developing countries worldwide.
China is leading the advancement of electric cars, it's something we already know very well. But what stands out is that the Asian giant, which in the past was criticized (and still is) for the huge CO2 emissions from its industry, is drastically changing the way it does things.
Not only is it developing electric vehicles and batteries, China is gaining prominence thanks to massive exportation of clean technologies. A comparison that starkly highlights the reference Western countries.
China's strategy against the Western world
The world moves at different speeds, and countries with more difficulties need the action of the so-called developed countries to contribute to a global necessity: massive reduction of pollutant emissions.
While Europe and other Western powers base their policies through loans and private financing to combat climate change, China is doing things very differently. And it's something that the automotive industry has served as an example and whose results we are already starting to see.
The Chinese government has primarily promoted direct subsidies to its own clean technology industries: electric cars, batteries, solar panels… Thanks to this strategy, so debated in Europe and which has led them to speak of unfair subsidies, China has managed to reduce the costs of its technologies and ensure that its manufacturers dominate international markets.
What’s the result? Developing countries, with fewer resources, find it easier to adopt clean technologies by buying from China much more economically. And that is what is happening with electric cars.
Electric cars, the best example
Years of planning and public subsidies, but also of intense internal competition that has led its manufacturers to a brutal price war, are now translating into massive exportation of electric cars to these countries.
Ethiopia, Pakistan, and other emerging markets, according to Reuters data, have benefited from the arrival of electric cars. According to the agency, two-thirds of China's solar panel and cell exports were destined for developing countries in 2025.
And meanwhile, here in the West, protectionist measures against Chinese manufacturers continue to be imposed, with additional tariffs on the entry of their electric cars in Europe and a complete closure in the United States.
The contradiction of China
We all have in our minds the television images from a few years ago where Chinese cities were invaded by dense clouds of pollution. The present reality is contradictory, because the fact that in China more than half of the cars sold are plug-in is changing the reality there.
To give you an idea: according to other Reuters data, the Chinese clean technology exports we've seen earlier prevent about 257 million tons of CO2 emissions annually. This figure is very similar to all the emissions that a country like France has in an entire year.
Not everything is gold that glitters in China, far from it: although its exports help lower CO2 emissions worldwide, the Asian giant is still responsible for almost a third of all global CO2 emissions. There, for example, more than half of its electricity is still generated with coal.
* This news is an AI translation of the original content. Motenic.com is part of Motor.es.
Fuente: Elektroauto