The high-end dialogue at the Fifth Shenzhen International Low-Carbon City (ILCC) Forum features profound international flavor. Shi Dinghuan, former Counselor of the State Council and former Director-General of China Renewable Energy Industry Association (CREIA); Francisco Carmela, Director of the Department of Sustainable Development, Environmental Destruction and EU & International Affairs under the Ministry of the Environment and Protection of Land and Sea; Tang Jie, former Vice Mayor of Shenzhen and a professor with Harbin Institute of Technology (Shenzhen); Wang Yi, a member of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress and Vice President of CAS Institutes of Science and Development; Bernd Dallmann, Director-General of European Environmental Foundation; and Robert Jestin, Chairman of Ecological Industry Cluster of Bretagne Region, France, respectively delivered wonderful speeches with respect to green, low carbon, and energy saving and emissions reductions. 

Shi Dinghuan said, Trump’s declaration of the US’ withdrawal wouldn’t affect the prospect of the implementation of Paris Agreement. The forces including China, many European countries and EU as well as numerous emerging countries and developing countries can actively boost the fulfillment of Paris Agreement in their future sustainable development. China has definitely declared that it will unswervingly promote the fulfillment of this Agreement. Even within the United States, there are also different voices. Lately, he met with Mr. Brown, Governor of California, who also definitely declared that, despite Trump’s declaration of the US’ withdrawal, the Californian government would continue unswervingly promote the process of Paris Agreement and it was believed that many US states were also doing so.           

According to Francisco Carmela, Paris Agreement adheres to the principle of voluntary commitment and nationally determined contributions (NDC). In terms of per capita in 2030, the US remains a rather big country and of course, will implement its commitments, and this should get recognized by everyone. In fact, the US’ withdrawal from Paris Agreement needs to be carried out in three years. It will take three years commencing from last year, as there will be a process of negotiations.

Tang Jie stated, currently, the low-carbon pilot cities determined by SDRC have made great achievements through more than five years’ efforts, and it is hard to describe such achievements in detail. But we can see that those more than 40 low-carbon cities determined by SDRC are of various kinds: some are the cities of low development level; some are heavy industry cities; and some are the cities of light industrial structure like Shenzhen; and different cities have different characteristics. But after five years, we can see that the current intensity of carbon emissions per unit GDP of China’s low-carbon pilot cities is notably lower than the national average. From such a viewpoint, the development, transformation and structural adjustment of cities and the change of lifestyle will as a whole constitute the important benchmarking and guidance for national low-carbon development. Up to now, 85% of carbon emissions have, after all, been produced in the cities.

Last year, Taiyuan adopted BYD E6 as all its taxies. This is the only city in the world that has used new-energy automobiles as all its taxies, and this deeply impressed him. Every year, New York and Paris apply for it and New York has won the award for two years in a row. An important content is that low-carbon cities should be able to more promote social welfare. One of the important factors is that low-income classes all live in shabby old houses, and the first renovation was the renovation of 2 million m2 of buildings as low-carbon buildings. He believes that the cities of different counties will certainly become the main body of carbon emissions.

Wang Yi stated, the response to climate change just conforms to China’s goals. To respond to climate change and increase non-fossil energy is closely related to the improvement of air pollution as a whole. And it is also closely related to the improvement of energy efficiency and economic benefits, and China should transform to green and low carbon. The climate warming during the past 100 years is over 95% likely to be artificially caused. As a responsible big country, China has become the second largest economy and played a very important role in that respect. China will strive for rights and obligations for the developing countries not only for itself alone but also as the representative of the developing countries. We have many South-South Cooperation friends, including African and other countries, and we hope we can jointly reduce emissions.

Bernd Dallmann, Director-General of European Environmental Foundation, stated, I feel that European countries are the same as China. We know very much about the importance of sustainability. All European countries will further develop and continue letting everyone get involved, and continue participating in the form of democratic economy. We have also noted that nature has more wealth, and we need new economic systems and these old capitalist systems. We play more important role in social economy and we should have more sense of responsibility. Of all the human activities as we currently know, traffic and transport have brought large quantities of CO2 emissions. In an era of technological innovation, we should enable our economy to catch up with technical revolution and better reduce the emissions of CO2 so as to achieve a healthy environment and relatively rapid economic growth. I believe China can make it, so does Europe.