China could overtake the US as the globe's biggest producer of greenhouse gases later this year, far earlier than expected, one of the world's leading energy bodies warned today.
If left unchecked, within 25 years emissions from China will be double those of the combined output of the US, EU, Japan and all other industrialised nations, said Fatih Birol, chief economist of the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The Paris-based organisation, which advises wealthy countries on energy policy, had previously said China was on course to become the world's biggest such polluter no earlier than 2009.
But such is the country's untrammelled economic growth, much of it driven by coal-fired power stations, this could potentially happen within months, Mr Birol told Guardian Unlimited.
"If Chinese economic growth, and therefore coal consumption, continues to surprise us, this may well be this year or next year," he said.
China's economy, which overtook that of the UK to become the fourth biggest in the world in late 2005, has grown by more than 10% a year for four straight years. Last week new data showed Chinese GDP grew 11.1% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2007, increasing fears the economy might be overheating.
While the country's government has begun tentatively investing in alternative energy sources, the bulk of the power for this economic transformation is being produced by domestically mined coal. According to forecasts, in the next decade China will build new power stations equivalent to the output of the entire EU.
Beijing has consistently refused to place restrictions on its emission of greenhouse gases, arguing that it should be allowed to follow the lead of western nations in industrialising rapidly through traditional power sources.
It is a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol, but is exempt from its restrictions because it is a developing country.
If its policies were left unchecked, China's greenhouse gas emissions would mean any efforts in other countries to combat global warming would effectively be useless, Mr Birol warned.
"Within the next 25 years, CO2 emissions which come from China alone will be double the CO2 emissions which will come from all the OECD countries put together - the whole US, plus Canada, plus all the European countries, Japan, Australia, New Zealand etc," he said.
Over the same time period, India's emissions were forecast to grow such that they were half the OECD total, Mr Birol added, calling this "very, very significant".
Any international efforts to find a successor to Kyoto, which expires in 2012, would be pointless without China and India signing up, Mr Birol said.
"There is no chance to be successful without having China and India on board," he said.
"That I can say with all certainty - without having China and India on board there is no chance of having a successful climate change policy, full stop. This is a very important fact."
Leaders in Beijing have begun talking about the need for change, though as yet with little action. Last month in his keynote address to the annual meeting of the country's rubber stamp parliament, China's premier, Wen Jiabao, called for a greener approach to economic growth.
Analysts believe China might eventually be forced into change largely due to the effects of global warming on its own territory, already apparent through the increasingly violent dust storms which whip Beijing and other northern areas.
According to a major report on climate change released by China's government yesterday, increasing temperatures will see spreading deserts, worsening droughts, shrinking glaciers and increased spread of diseases. Wheat, rice and corn yields could fall by more than a third in the second half of this century, it said.
However, the National Climate Change Assessment Report concluded that the country should focus on development before cutting greenhouse gas emissions.
Despite this, John Prescott, was assured of China's good intentions over the issue during a visit to Beijing yesterday.
Beijing "attaches great importance to the climate change issue", the country's former foreign minister, Tang Jiaxuan, told the deputy prime minister, according to the Xinhua news agency.