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Sunnylands climate negotiations yield landmark methane and fossil fuel agreement between the United States and China
To effectively address the climate change crisis, cooperation between the world’s two largest emitters of carbon dioxide, the United States and China, is critical.
On November 4-7, 2023, Sunnylands hosted four intensive days of climate change negotiations between former Secretary of State John Kerry, then the U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, and his counterpart from China, Minister Xie Zhenhua.
When the talks at Sunnylands concluded, negotiators reached an agreement called the Sunnylands Statement on Enhancing Cooperation to Address the Climate Crisis. The statement committed the United States and China to accelerating a reduction of coal, oil, and gas generation.
The agreement also re-established the Working Group on Enhancing Climate Action in the 2020s, which had been defunct for several years due to tensions in the U.S.-China relationship.
Finally, the United States and China committed to further discussions on phasing out methane and other pollutants known as non-CO2 emissions. Specifically, the countries were called to jointly host a summit on methane reduction at a key United Nations meeting of global climate negotiators (known as the 28th Conference of Parties, or COP28), that took place in Dubai in December 2023. At the methane summit, ministers from around the world pledged to cut methane emissions by 30 percent by 2030; and fifty global oil and gas companies announced they would shore up leaky methane systems by 2030, all moves that could rapidly reduce emissions of the potent gas and forestall some climate change effects.
At the summit in Dubai, Secretary Kerry specifically thanked Sunnylands in his opening remarks, stating the methane summit “is an outgrowth of the meeting we had at Sunnylands. We spent four days negotiating, talking, and thinking, and having a little fun here and there. This was an agreement that we made [there] to have a summit here to talk about the issue of methane.”
Months later, in a panel discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations, Secretary Kerry reflected on his time at Sunnylands.
“Foreign ministers told me again and again that we could not have reached the Dubai consensus without China and the United States finding common ground in a series of meetings throughout this administration, but particularly in Sunnylands, California, last fall,” he said. “At Sunnylands, we spent four days together negotiating the Sunnylands [Statement], and China agreed that all countries should put in all greenhouse gases in your NDC [Nationally Determined Contributions, or greenhouse gas reduction targets] and they agreed they would accelerate the reduction of emissions in this decade. That is a huge move forward.”
