Eugene Robinson: Momentum for clean energy

Republicans in Congress — and on the presidential campaign trail — vow to do everything they can to sabotage this effort, claiming it will be bad for the economy.

The large-scale burning of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution has sharply increased the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by 40 percent, and this increase, because of the greenhouse effect, has warmed the planet.

[...] the nation's leaders have come to realize that the noxious, choking, particulate-laden smog that sometimes blankets cities — as is happening this week in Beijing — poses a real threat to the Communist Party's legitimacy.

Having ushered hundreds of millions into the urban middle class, the leadership is obliged to provide a reasonably safe environment for these people to raise their children.

The other big development in China is that the leadership — rather than deny climate science, as most Republicans do — is making a huge bet on clean energy.

The Paris summit could yet fail; India, the third-biggest carbon emitter, balks at limits that would curb its economic growth and wants rich countries to help it bear the cost of leapfrogging the "dirty" stage of development.