John Kerry bids farewell to the fray

Secretary of State cites progress by Obama administration on climate change, clean energy

Outgoing Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday paid probably his last call as the US' top diplomat for continued efforts on climate change and clean energy, citing the critical role of US-China cooperation.

In a speech at MIT, Kerry touted the major progress made by President Barack Obama's administration on climate change and clean energy, including the Paris climate agreement signed by 196 parties in December 2015.

"We actually took major initiative in that when I went to China within a month and a half of becoming secretary of state, and improbably we engaged in a dialogue with the Chinese that moved us away from the failure of Copenhagen towards cooperation so that President Xi (Jinping) and President Obama could stand up a year later together in Beijing and announce our mutual intended reductions and our plans in order to deal with climate," Kerry said.

"That changed the whole playing field."

With Boston Mayor Marty Walsh in the audience, Kerry also noted the third annual US-China Climate Change Leaders' Summit to be held in the city this year. Kerry and Walsh announced the third meeting in June last year during the second summit in Beijing. The first summit took place in September 2015 in Los Angeles.

Kerry, who described himself soon to be "the most visible unemployed person in America," said he intends to stay involved as "Citizen Kerry".

Progress in climate change and clean energy has been regarded by the Obama administration as its major legacy. Obama has mentioned it several times in his recent speeches and is likely to mention it again in his farewell speech in Chicago Tuesday night.

On the White House website, it is one of the five areas in focus. The US-China cooperation on this front is also highlighted, including the joint announcement in November 2014 for the US to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025 and for China to peak its carbon emissions around 2030 and increase its share of zero-carbon energy capacity to 20 percent.

China-US cooperation in climate change has become a bright spot in recent years in a bilateral relationship that is deemed by many as the most consequential in the 21st century but is also haunted by deep distrust and mistrust on the geopolitical front.

Kerry, while pointing out the health challenges facing China from the excessive burning of coal, also praised China's massive efforts in developing clean energy.

"In fact, emerging economies like China, India and Brazil invested even more in renewable technologies last year than the developed world. China alone invested more than $100 billion," Kerry said.

He said no nation will do well if it sits on the sidelines, choking on the fumes generated by obsolete technologies and failing to share in the benefits of the clean-tech explosion.

The words may seem to be pointed at President-elect Donald Trump, who will take office on Jan 20. During the presidential race, Trump described climate change as a hoax invented by the Chinese and said he would cancel the Paris agreement.

He also blamed Obama's clean energy policy for slowing business growth and job creation. After winning the election, Trump has changed his tone and said he would keep an open mind on the Paris agreement.

Several of Trump's nominations are regarded by critics as having a bad record on the climate and clean energy. They include Kerry's possible successor Rex Tillerson, a former CEO of Exxon Mobil, whose hearing is set for Wednesday, and Scott Pruitt, Trump's pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency.

Kerry said he is "not going to speculate about the politics that our president-elect and secretary of state will choose to pursue".

"Climate change shouldn't be a partisan issue," Kerry said. "It's an issue that all of us should care about, regardless of political affiliation."

"China is now the world's largest emitter, it's a huge market, it has the bandwidth to do this in diplomatic and scientific terms, so it's not going to be the case that if the US walks away that the mechanism will collapse," Bruce Jones, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, wrote on the institution's website on Saturday.

"What will happen is that the mechanism will continue and the US will not be a leader; China will lead," he said.

chenweihua@chinadailyusa.com