VP Joe Biden aims to build resolve for global climate treaty

Joe Biden meeting with US, Chinese leaders in LA

Vice President Joe Biden will address US-China Climate Leaders Summit in Los Angeles on Wednesday.  Twitter photo.

WASHINGTON – Vice-President Joe Biden will call on other nations to commit to ambitious cuts in greenhouse gases at a gathering of U.S. and Chinese leaders on Wednesday in Los Angeles.

Biden’s address to the U.S.-China Climate Leaders Summit was designed to lay the groundwork for Chinese President Xi Jinping’s highly anticipated visit to the White House next Friday, where he’ll meet with President Barack Obama and be honored at a state dinner. The White House said Obama and Xi planned to discuss the outcome of the summit, which aims to build pressure on other major polluters as climate negotiators rush to finish a major global climate treaty ahead of a U.N. summit in December in Paris.

Biden was also to pay a visit Wednesday to a solar power trade show in Anaheim, California, that organizers say is the largest in North America. In tandem with his visit, the Obama administration was designating more than $120 million for new and existing clean energy projects in 24 U.S. states, the White House said. Some $32 million will go to the Energy Department’s SunShot research and development program to make solar technology cost-effective.

The California swing comes as Biden is deeply immersed in deliberations with his family and advisers about whether to run for president. In recent days, Biden has opened a window into those deliberations, describing his lingering doubts about whether he has the emotional strength to mount a viable campaign just months after his son, Beau, died from brain cancer.

At the same time, Biden has kept up an intensive travel schedule, crisscrossing through Florida, Georgia, New York and now California, stops that have done little to quell speculation that he’s laying the groundwork for a potential campaign.

Ahead of Biden’s appearance at the climate summit, the White House announced that 11 Chinese cities and provinces would cap their emissions earlier than China’s national goal of 2030. Beijing and Guangzhou, two of China’s largest cities, pledged that their carbon dioxide emissions will peak by 2020, with other major cities like Shenzhen following in later years.

On the U.S. side, cities like Los Angeles, Atlanta and Houston were announcing a series of commitments to reduce emissions, mandate use of renewable energy sources and cut fuel consumption.

Last year, the world’s two largest polluters clinched a groundbreaking agreement on emissions during Obama’s visit to Beijing. The U.S. pledged to cut its greenhouse gas emissions up to 28 per cent by 2025, compared to 2005 levels. China’s emissions are still rising as the country rapidly builds new coal plants, but the country vowed that it will peak by 2030, if not sooner.

The Canadian Press