countries should be bound by international laws. China and the EU also put forward
different methods for calculating the assignment of responsibility for emission
reduction. At the 2008 PoznańClimate Change Conference, China proposed a
method for calculating carbon emission from countries—“per capita cumulative
carbon emission”; based on this, Chinese scholars put forward a“carbon budget
proposal”based on per capita historical cumulative emission and protection of
global climate.^20 At the 2011 Durban Conference, BRICs scholars jointly proposed
to take fair carbon emission permit allocations as the method for building the
post-2012 international climate system. Competition in sharing of responsibilities is
the centremost competition between China and the EU in climate governance, and
this exerts the greatest impact on China-EU climate relations.
Second, regarding the climate fund issue, China held the principled stand that
developed countries should provide additional aid funds to developing countries
which incur additional burden as a result of protecting global climate change and
adapting to such change. In negotiations, China and the Group of 77 proposed that
funds for mitigation and adaptation to climate change should be managed by an
institution authorized by the Conference of Parties of the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Changeand transparency of the operation and
additionality of fund sources should be maintained. In 2011, the Green Climate
Fund was officially launched, and a permanent committee for funding mechanisms
composed of the same number of members from countries specified in Annex I and
those not specified in Annex I was established; this committee reports to and
receives guidance from the Conference of Parties. The Green Climate Fund does
not adopt a contributor-oriented governance structure, which is a victory of the
group of developing countries over the group of developed countries. At the 2011
Durban Climate Conference, the EU proposed that aviation and maritime emission
trading income and funds from the private sector should serve as sources for the
Green Climate Fund. This proposal essentially incorporates developing countries
into the scope of funding and mitigates the funding responsibility of developed
countries. Negotiations concerning such issues as climate funding obligation, fund
source, use and management mechanisms, etc. are still underway, and the struggle
between China and the EU has also continued.
Third,“measureable, reportable and verifiable”is an information notification
requirement of theBali Action Planfor domestic mitigation actions taken by
developing countries with support from developed countries. At the Copenhagen
and Cancun Climate Conference, the EU and the USA proposed that all domestic
mitigation actions of developing countries should be reviewed according to the
criteria of“measureable, reportable and verifiable”. China and the Group of 77
believed that this requirement violated the requirement specified in the Convention
that emission reduction targets of developed countries should be“measureable,
reportable and verifiable”and domestic voluntary emission reduction targets of
developing countries are not subject to international supervision. A compromise
(^20) Jiahua ( 2008 ), Jiahua and Ying ( 2009 ).
9 China-EU Relations in the Context of Global Climate Governance 175