Climate change is a global issue that attracts global attention. This issue is resulting in temperature rise, sea-level rise, the high frequency of extreme weather and climate conditions as well as the extinction of endangered species, having an increasingly serious impact on the ecosystem and living environment of human beings. Thus, this is an issue of great importance that demands prompt solutions.

We has acknowledged the positive results of greenhouse gas emission control and reduction to alleviate climate change and we fully support the China,s National Climate Change Programme by taking measures to reduce carbon emissions and increase carbon absorption in order to contribute to alleviating climate change effects.

Participate in the founding of the China Green Carbon Fund

There are two ways to reduce greenhouse gases: one is to reduce carbon emissions, the other is to increase carbon absorption. The forest is the largest carbon pool in the terrestrial ecosystem. According to research, every cubic meter of trees can absorb 1.83 tons CO₂ and release 1.62 tons O₂. Carbon sequestration is the term used to designate the process, activity or mechanism of eliminating CO₂ from the atmosphere. Forestry carbon sequestration is a process that, with plantation and management of forests, absorbs CO2 in the air by means of photosynthesis and sequestrated in plants or soil in the form of biomass. Such process is one of the most effective measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

In July 2007, PetroChina contributed to China's Green Carbon Fund jointly initiated with CNPC, the State Forestry Administration and the China Green Foundation. The Fund is a national specialized public fund under the China Green Foundation designated to providing a platform for enterprises, organizations and individuals concerned about climate change to participate in activities such as tree planting and forest protection. CNPC has donated RMB300 million yuan to the Fund including RMB100 million yuan from PetroChina. The Fund is solely used to implement the forestry carbon sequestration campaign. It is estimated that 5 million tons to 10 million tons CO2 would be sequestrated in the next 10 years.

Cooperation in developing forestry bio-energy

China now has 4 million hectares of wood oil forestry. There are 154 kinds of plants with oil contents of 40% or higher. If the current plants are utilized to develop bio-energy, the annual biomass will be of about 300 million tons, equivalent to 200 million tons standard coal. If these resources are fully utilized, the consumption of fossil energy will be reduced by 10%. In addition, there are 57 million hectares of wasted land suitable for plantation and 100 million hectares of marginal land unsuitable for agricultural development in China. If these lands are used to plant wood oil trees, sustainable bio-energy can be attained by substituting fossil energy to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases and form large carbon pools to absorb CO2 at the same time. Thus, bio-energy development through forestry is one of the best approaches in response to climate change.

In 2007, CNPC signed a cooperation framework agreement to develop forestry bio-energy with the State Forestry Administration and governments at provincial, municipal and autonomous region levels in Sichuan, Yunnan and Shandong, etc. Through this agreement, where PetroChina was responsible for the execution, we have actively nurtured the co-operation between enterprises and local authorities to enhance the development of energy forest bases and the transformation and utilization of bio-energy. By the end of 2007, we had constructed 68,000 hectares of energy forest bases in Sichuan, Yunnan as well as other provinces.