Obama, Xi announce plans to fight climate change

U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping announced joint plans to combat carbon emissions and climate change at the end of an international diplomatic summit in Beijing.

The New York Times reports that the United States has pledged to reduce its carbon emissions from the level recorded in 2005 by 26 percent by the year 2025. China promised to reach its peak of carbon emissions around the year 2030.

Many scientists, activists, and concerned citizens hope that the announcement will enable major agreements to be reached at an upcoming summit on combatting climate change scheduled to take place in Paris in 2015.

The Times notes that while the agreement between China and the United States is important because both nations are often competing with each other for political and economic dominance, the agreement will not stop a temperature increase of 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. It is at that point that many scientists believe the planet will enter a new, unpredictable era of unprecedented and catastrophic environmental changes.

The Times also points out that many other countries that pollute heavily, such as Saudi Arabia and Australia, do not seem inclined to act on the matter.

Australia recently passed one of the world's first taxes on carbon emissions, but it was repealed after a change in government and the issue has been effectively shelved for the time being.

The Times says another stalwart nation unlikely to take steps to battle climate change is India. India believes that its massive amounts of poverty and relatively low level of development should allow it not to participate in carbon reducing measures.

The agreement between the United States and China comes just weeks after a United Nations report made by representatives of governments around the world warned that at current rates of carbon emissions, global warming will become irreversible within the next decade.