As Moscow’s isolation from the West deepens and Beijing’s great power competition with Washington intensifies, China and Russia have forged an increasingly consequential partnership that extends far beyond their traditional military and economic ties.
While both powers maintain that they are not formal allies, their proclamation of a “no limits” partnership with “no forbidden areas” has crystallized into what Western observers view as a de facto alliance, particularly in the wake of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
The evolving China-Russia partnership encompasses wide-ranging collaboration that spans numerous cross-cutting sectors. Among these, climate change emerges as the defining challenge of the 21st century that both countries have pledged to address together.
In 2021, Russia adopted a National Security Strategy incorporating the concept of ecological security, which explicitly addresses climate change. Subsequent bilateral announcements have reinforced this commitment to climate transition, emphasizing plans to enhance cooperation in climate action and decarbonization.
In 2024, a joint declaration between China and Russia pledged to strengthen bilateral investment in low-carbon sectors, including renewable energy and carbon markets.
Despite their rhetorical commitments to climate collaborations, some critics point out that substantive collaboration is notably absent from their bilateral agenda. The 2024 China-Russia Joint Statement tellingly emphasizes “deepening” cooperation in traditional energy sectors, such as natural gas, coal, and oil refining, while merely suggesting the possibility of “developing” collaboration in emerging fields like carbon markets and renewable energy.
This disparity is further evidenced in the 2024 handbook on bilateral investments, published by the Russia-China Investment Collaboration Committee. While references to conventional “power generation” appear sixteen times, exclusively in the context of natural gas projects, terms like “green” and “low carbon” receive only cursory mention.
Beyond modest proposals for hydrogen and ammonia development, the handbook’s energy and mining section is largely devoted to fossil fuel projects. Indeed, 2024 customs data shows that Russia has become China’s top crude oil and natural gas supplier, with fossil fuel dwarfing climate-related product exports.
The slow progress in bilateral climate collaboration between China and Russia is alarming. As the world’s largest and fourth largest carbon emitters, both nations have pledged to achieve net-zero emissions by 2060.
However, their ongoing investments in fossil fuel infrastructure threaten to undermine global confidence. It discourages climate financing from other developed countries, delays the transition to net zero, and diverts economic resources from sustainable infrastructure and renewable energy incentives.
The US’ stunning withdrawal from multilateral climate engagements under the second Trump administration further renders it indispensable for other major emitters to uphold their commitments. This leadership vacuum presents an opportunity for China and Russia to step into a more prominent role in influencing the global climate transition.
However, to establish credibility as climate leaders, both countries must translate diplomatic rhetoric into concrete action, establishing clear timelines for climate projects while reducing their extensive fossil fuel collaboration.
Several sectors offer promising pathways for meaningful climate cooperation between the two nations, including hydrogen development, carbon market integration, and critical minerals partnerships.
Hydrogen infrastructure development
Hydrogen holds immense potential as a clean alternative to fossil fuels in a wide range of applications, spanning from transportation fuel sources and energy storage medium to feedstock in industrial processes like steelmaking.
Unlike fossil fuels, hydrogen does not release carbon dioxide when burned. But its climate benefits are contingent on low-emission production methods. Hydrogen produced with water electrolysis using renewable power can be completely emission-free, but its exorbitant costs remain a significant hurdle for large-scale commercialization.
Blue hydrogen refers to hydrogen produced from natural gas, equipped with carbon capture and storage (CCS) facilities. Though blue hydrogen is now facing criticism, it has still been regarded as a less costly, compromise alternative before the costs of green hydrogen become tolerable.
Enhancing joint investment in the hydrogen industry aligns with China’s and Russia’s strategic advantages. Russia’s abundant natural gas reserves and extensive pipeline infrastructure suit the country for blue hydrogen production and transport.
Gazprom’s existing pipelines can already carry natural gas blended with up to 20% hydrogen, with newer infrastructure potentially accommodating up to 70%. This capacity underpins Russia’s ambitious goal to capture 20% of the global hydrogen market by 2035. Europe is naturally a key destination for Russia’s hydrogen, but European sanctions on Russian exports following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have rendered this prospect bleak.
China complements these assets with its technological expertise in hydrogen production and storage, along with its position as the world’s leading producer of renewable energy. To increase the emission reduction benefits of blue hydrogen, the two countries should make joint R&D and investment in CCS technologies in their national hydrogen industry strategies.
Looking beyond controversial blue hydrogen, the partnership could leverage China’s renewable capacity to generate green hydrogen for transportation through Russia’s vast pipeline network, potentially reducing production costs significantly.
Hydrogen is notoriously challenging to store and transport. To make its hydrogen exports attractive to China, Russia needs to expand energy infrastructure along their shared border. While existing natural gas pipelines could be adapted, new dedicated hydrogen and ammonia pipelines would be essential.
The expansive, underdeveloped regions along the Sino-Russian border offer ideal testing grounds for innovative hydrogen infrastructure. These areas could host integrated hydrogen hubs combining production, storage, and diverse end-use applications, establishing replicable models for hydrogen ecosystem development.
The partnership could extend beyond physical infrastructure to shape global standards. Joint research into pipeline materials optimized for hydrogen transport and advanced liquefaction techniques could set international benchmarks for safety and efficiency.
Such technical collaboration would strengthen both countries’ positions in the emerging global hydrogen market while accelerating technology development.
Carbon market integration
The carbon market is another area with strong collaboration potential. A recent example of potential collaboration is Sinopec and SIBUR’s involvement in China’s Carbon Trading Market. Chinese oil giant Sinopec is a shareholder of SIBUR, Russia’s largest integrated petrochemicals company that also has the second-largest carbon emissions reduction projects in the country.
Through the project’s registration with the Global Carbon Council system, SIBUR will become the first Russian company to issue carbon units in an international system since the establishment of Russia’s carbon trading system. SIBUR has registered five climate projects in the Russian carbon emissions registry system.
These projects are expected to achieve a combined reduction effect of 7.5 million tons of CO2 equivalent over ten years. SIBUR’s connection to Sinopec creates opportunities for entry into the Chinese carbon trading market, provided appropriate validation systems and high standards are established.
Despite these initial efforts toward cross-border carbon trading, the potential for deeper collaboration in carbon markets remains largely untapped. Rather than simply linking existing systems, China and Russia could pioneer innovative methodologies to carbon valuation that better reflect their national idiosyncrasies.
For instance, they could jointly develop new methodologies for valuing natural carbon sequestration, such as Russia’s vast Siberian forest. It is a massive carbon sink hub with growing enthusiasm by the Russian government for monetization through carbon offset. The two nations could also create novel financial instruments that bundle carbon credits with clean technology transfer, creating more attractive investment vehicles for international investors.
Another unexplored opportunity lies in developing joint carbon accounting standards specifically designed for cross-border industrial projects. This could include creating specialized carbon credit categories for emissions reductions achieved through Sino-Russian technological collaboration, particularly in hard-to-abate sectors like steel and cement production.
Such standards could later serve as a model for other developing nations seeking to balance industrial growth with emissions reduction.
Critical minerals
China is rapidly ascending as a global hub for clean technology R&D and manufacturing, particularly in the “new big three” sectors: solar, electric vehicles (EVs), and batteries. These focal points of China’s clean energy initiative create strategic opportunities for Russia’s vast resources of critical minerals.
Russia possesses some of the world’s largest reserves of copper and nickel, ranking among the top ten globally for both metals. These resources are fundamental to the clean energy transition, especially in transportation.
Copper serves multiple functions in EVs, from battery components and motor windings to charging infrastructure, while nickel is essential for high-energy-density batteries and corrosion-resistant components in wind turbines and solar cells.
As an example of Russia-China collaboration in critical minerals, Nornickel, Russia’s leading metals and mining company, produces 15% of the world’s best high-grade nickel and is also a global leader in copper production.
The company is pivoting toward the Chinese market to reduce the sanction’s impacts. In 2024, the company announced plans to significantly increase metals supply to China and establish joint ventures in battery materials processing and copper refinery.
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the US and UK introduced a ban on imports of Russian aluminum, copper, and nickel. Russian metals also can no longer be traded on the London Metals Exchange and Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
China’s interest in Russian minerals stems partly from growing Western pressure on its critical mineral supply chains. As the United States pushes allies like Indonesia to limit mineral exports to China, cooperation with Russian producers offers Beijing supply chain diversification while providing Moscow with capital and technical expertise for production expansion.
This partnership could reshape global metals markets: with Western exchanges closed to Russian metals, the Shanghai Futures Exchange stands to gain prominence in setting international benchmarks and promoting yuan-denominated trading.
While copper and nickel feature prominently in current bilateral agreements, the deepening global climate transition implies that demand for these metals will grow exponentially. Both countries are positioned to rapidly expand mining and refining capacity, potentially outpacing the traditionally slow-moving mining industry.
The partnership could extend to other strategic minerals, notably palladium, where Russia dominates global production. It is used in the metal connections attaching chips to circuit boards. Russia is the world’s largest palladium producer. Through just two projects, Russia controls 40% of world palladium output, a metal crucial for semiconductor manufacturing.
Climate cooperation leadership
Climate cooperation remains underdeveloped in the ever-growing China-Russia partnership. Some areas, including hydrogen development, carbon market integration, and critical mineral collaboration, offer transformative potential.
The success of their climate collaboration will depend on several key factors. First, both countries must materialize their diplomatic agreements through actionable programs, establishing clear timelines and measurable outcomes.
Second, their partnership in critical minerals and hydrogen infrastructure needs to extend beyond bilateral benefits to contribute to global climate solutions. Third, their carbon market integration efforts must evolve from isolated projects to systematic cooperation that can serve as a model for other developing countries.
As climate transition efforts face political headwinds globally, strong Sino-Russian leadership in climate policy could significantly influence the trajectory of global emissions reduction efforts, but only if both nations prioritize long-term climate gains over short-term fossil fuel interests.
Chris Zou is a climate policy researcher at World Resources Institute (wri.org) based in Washington DC.
