While world officials attempt to rein in carbon emissions from corporations, China remains the world's biggest polluter on a national scale. Former US Secretary of State John Kerry is among US officials continuing to open up dialogues with Chinese representatives to reach a consensus on mandating green resolutions.
"We have to all be at the table and doing it, and that includes China, which is the largest emitter in the world. We're the second largest emitter. We're the largest economy, they're the second largest economy," Kerry explains. "So, that's why China and the United States have been sitting down to try to figure out where are the areas we may be able to cooperate together in the interest of the whole planet and its citizens everywhere."
It's all part of Yahoo Finance's exclusive coverage from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where our team will speak to top decision-makers as well as preeminent leaders in business, finance, and politics about the world’s most pressing issues and priorities for the coming year.
JULIE HYMAN: Secretary Kerry, all of these companies have made these pledges.
What about the other largest polluter in the world, of course, China?
Your counterpart there is also stepping down.
What's your level of confidence that momentum will continue with China and in cooperation with China on this issue?
JOHN KERRY: Well, I can't express that in terms of my confidence or lack of confidence.
You know, we have to do all the things we promised to do, all of us.
And we now have greater transparency and accountability in the system to know whether people are keeping their promises or not.
We have satellite technology that now has the ability to track methane, track CO2, determine the footprint of any big corporation in the world.
So people are not gonna be able to hide inaction or not enough action.
We will have accountability.
Now, China has brought a massive amount of coal plants online.
And frankly, it's been one of the areas of discussion between us.
But China is also manufacturing and deploying more renewables than all the rest of the world put together.
So we have to see how this unfolds.
We agreed to work with China in a transparent constructive way, accountable.
We're not giving up anything in doing that.
But it's a way for us to make certain that we are all in this together because no one country can solve this problem alone.
We have to all be at the table and doing it.
And that includes China, which is the largest emitter in the world.
We're the second largest emitter.
We're the largest economy.
They're the second largest economy.
So that's why China and the United States have been sitting down to try to figure out where are the areas we may be able to cooperate together in the interests of the whole planet and of citizens everywhere.
BRIAN SOZZI: Four years into the presidency of Joe Biden, what is the state of our relationship with China?
JOHN KERRY: Obviously, there are very real issues between us, which we have fundamental differences on.
[COUGHS] Excuse me.
And President Biden and President Xi sat down recently in meetings in California in San Francisco.
I was privileged to be part of the large discussion that we had.
And both leaders were very clear about the interests that they are duty-bound to protect.
And we needed to understand from President Xi.
And they needed to understand from President Biden.
I think President Biden made it crystal clear where the differences are that we need to work on.
And there are big issues-- access to the marketplace, theft of intellectual property, the questions of what's gonna happen to nuclear weapons, both with China as well as with Kim Jong Un in North Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan.
I mean, there are a lot of these issues.
But President Biden and President Xi decided early on in President Biden's administration that we were gonna work to try to keep the climate issue separate because it's not a bilateral issue.
It's a multilateral, global issue where all of us are involved.
And every one of US needs the rest of the big polluters, big emitters in the world to come to the table and be part of the solution.
President Biden has been leading in that effort, holding a summit, two or three virtual summits now in the last three years in which he has brought the largest emitters in the world to the table and raised the ambition of each and every one of those countries to be able to address this issue faster.
So I think his leadership has been critical.
The passage of the IRA in the United States is creating an amazing amount of jobs at home.
It's the strongest environmental legislation in the world.
There are other countries that wish they had it.
And the result of it is that we're creating jobs on new technologies, which is gonna lower the cost of energy for Americans.
Example, solar has come down 83% in price, distinctively cheaper than fossil fuel energy.
And in fact, last year, solar alone had a greater amount of investment than fossil fuels did.
So we're seeing the transformation really beginning to take hold now.
And my sense is that China and the United States need to work together in order to make sure we meet our goals.
