China and US should lead fossil fuel subsidies reform at G20

Pete Ogden and Ben Bovarnick discuss why this year's G20 summit is an opportunity for China and the United States to jointly push the world towards a climate safe future.

In September of this year, Barack Obama will travel to China for the last time as president to participate in the G20 meeting in Hangzhou. Climate change cooperation has been a signature feature of US-China relations during the Obama administration, and there is every reason to expect that both countries will want to mark this visit with a final demonstration of their ability to lead together on the issue. Fortunately, this year’s G20 presents a unique opportunity to do just that by taking on a critical piece of the climate challenge that still needs to be addressed: the elimination of fossil fuel subsidies.

This is not new territory for the G20. At their meeting in 2009 in Pittsburgh, the leaders of the world’s largest developed and developing economies all pledged to “rationalise and phase out over the medium term inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption”.

The above excerpt was originally published in chinadialogue. Click here to view the full article.

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