In between the few who insist that man isn’t changing the climate, and the scientists who know that he is, there’s another group who agree man is responsible but argue it’s not up to poor little UK to improve matters. They reckon it’s the responsibility of over a billion Chinese who now produce more CO2 than any other nation.

This uninformed view ignores the persistence of CO2 in the atmosphere for centuries, so since industrialisation began the USA has produced almost a third of all emissions, the Chinese only a tenth. It’s also true that individual contributions are much smaller in China as it has five times the population of the United States, and more than twice the number in Europe. Also much of the Chinese CO2 is ours by proxy as many western industries have been outsourced.

However all of that could now be historical as China is very serious about reducing its emissions, with 2030 the target date. Already it leads the world in renewable energy. The simple reason is air quality and health considerations, and, whether we approve or not, they are more likely to be successful than us as their lack of representative democracy means self interest is not allowed to delay the national ambition. ‘Nimby’ is not a tolerated stance.

It’s not surprising that up to half a million die prematurely ever year when only one percent of city dwellers enjoy European air quality standards. Most cities frequently exceed 500 particulates per cubic metre of air when 25 is the acceptable limit. It’s all about cars and coal-fired power stations and the task is formidable. Despite low vehicle ownership, 70 per thousand, compared with 600 in Europe, there are 240 million vehicles, rising by 20 million every year.

Initial plans are to increase regulation on vehicle exhausts and to scrap six million of the older diesel vehicles. By 2020 there will be five million electric cars on the streets though they will need to be topped up from the twenty per cent of the electricity produced by wind turbines, the largest number in the world, rather than the coal-fired power stations.

They are decommissioning many of these inefficient coal units and replacing them with larger, slightly cleaner ones, and the 28 nuclear power stations currently under construction will help matters.

Despite these efforts it’s likely that the extensive black toxic cloud that blankets much of urban China will persist for years, and in some ways it helps to keep the planet cooler. Clean air does not reflect solar radiation back out to space so if the Chinese are successful in improving their atmosphere we will all heat up.