KEY POINTS:
Chinese President Hu Jintao, leader of the world's largest polluter, yesterday pushed his nation fully into efforts to combat climate change.
Speaking on the eve of an Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation summit that will focus heavily on the globe's most pressing environmental concern, Mr Hu urged support for
the United Nations' climate change process.
"We very much hope that this Sydney Declaration [by Apec leaders] will give full expression to the position that the UN framework convention on climate change would remain the main channel for international efforts to tackle climate change," he said.
Mr Hu's stand followed widespread perceptions that China remained one of the most significant barriers to global reduction of greenhouse gas emissions because of its heavy reliance on high-pollution coal-fired energy.
But a study produced for the Apec summit by Australia's Climate Institute said efforts to portray China as the "greenhouse bogeyman" were misleading and had set back climate change talks by a decade.
The study said policies already in place in China could reduce emissions by 1.7 billion tonnes a year by 2010 - equivalent to shutting Australia's power stations for a decade - and more than half the Kyoto Protocol's clean development projects had been registered in the nation.
China's investment in renewable energy accounted for 9 per cent of the global total.
Foreign Minister Winston Peters, in Sydney for ministerial talks ahead of the Apec summit, said China was wrestling with the predicaments of progress.
"You've got an explosive economy of 1.2 billion people and they have huge problems that they've got to solve," he said.
Mr Hu's call for "common but differentiated responsibilities" - meaning that developing countries should have greater leeway in reducing greenhouse gas emissions - is reflected in the ministerial communique that will be presented to the leaders at the weekend.
With other developing Asian countries wary of commitments at Apec and supporting the series of UN meetings that will continue in the next few months in New York and Bali, the ministers avoided specific targets or measures and produced only a generalised wish list.
Their communique proposes a range of initiatives to reduce the environmental impact of surging energy demand and encourages the development of a mix of diversified energy sources, including natural gas, biofuels and other renewable energy.
New Zealand is relieved that the communique passes quickly over nuclear energy - it refers only to its use by "interested economies" - but Mr Peters warned that other players, including the US and Australia, wanted to push the nuclear option.
"It's whether or not any additions are to be made to it later [and in] a 21-nation grouping, that's a challenge."