Chinese media welcomes climate deal with US The US-China deal on carbon emissions received a broadly positive response in China in the media and from experts. While the Chinese press mostly carried news stories about the deal and not much analysis in comparison to the western press, it was was welcoming of a deal some described as "historic." The Chinese state-run newspaper China Daily carried an editorial describing the goals announced by the US and China as exemplary. It said the China-US joint announcement on climate change was the real highlight of the meeting between Xi Jinping and Barack Obama and the unexpected outcome was "a pleasant surprise." The newspaper described the Chinese pledges as a huge commitment in a country where "development carries the only hope of freeing hundreds of millions from their daily struggle for subsistence." The newspaper also praised the US part of the deal calling it "an ambitious goal that entails a shared political will across party lines back home." The paper added that the China-US deal will help in "persuading reluctant others" at the UN climate negotiations. The news website news.21cn carried a story saying that if China and the US achieve the aims of the deal, it will not only contribute to improve the environment, but also encourage other countries to reduce emissions. Popular news magazine website, Paper.cn, said in an editorial that it is only with the consensus between the US and China that a global climate change deal can be reached. It said that in China the solutions to cope with climate change "closely relate to the systems, policies and market motivations" relating to dealing with pollution and that the speeding up of action on one "will bring motivation to the other." While experts were mostly optimistic that China could reach its stated target of capping emissions and increasing its use of energy from zero-emission sources to 20% by 2030, they also outlined the challenges in achieving the target. On the whole experts working in the area of environment and climate change in China welcomed the announcement but some were more enthusiastic of its significance than others. It is positive for China for the first time to make a commitment on the peaking of carbon emissions. It is very important because the previous commitment was only on carbon intensity," said Ma Jun, one of China's most well-known environmentalists and director of the NGO the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs. He said that to achieve the target will be challenging because "China's energy is very much focused on coal and the economy is very focused on heavy industry which is carbon intensive so restructuring won't be easy." But I think that the momentum generated to solve the local air pollution problem is a push for such a commitment. To deal with local pollution, China has put on the agenda the capping of coal, which has long been a sensitive issue," he added. Peggy Liu Chairperson of the Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy, based in Shanghai, was not as enthusiastic about the "newness" of what was being agreed. "Like many bilateral agreements between the US and China, much of this was repackaged current thinking for a good timely news story," she said. But Liu said that it is very positive in it's significance for the UN climate change negotiations and is a "welcome injection of positive energy." Of China's part of the agreement she said China didn't say anything new. The internal estimates for peaking carbon were always 2030, mainly based on when urbanisation would peak. China has talked about 20% renewables by 2030 for years already. But she said that internally, the Chinese government is looking at how to increase the renewable figure even higher. Li Shuo, senior climate and energy policy officer with Greenpeace East Asia, said the Chinese commitment is "really significant" and that the task in hand should not be underestimated because it requires China "to build another US energy system based on renewable energy." He said China "will really need reform of the electricity market and how the grid operates. That's why the 20% target carries significance.