May 27 (Bloomberg) -- China, the world’s second-biggest energy consumer, views global warming as more serious than the world financial crisis, President Hu Jintao’s special representative on climate change wrote in an editorial.

Xie Zhenhua, also vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, said China is working on provincial climate change programs this year, and that the stimulus plan contains energy conservation and pollution components, according to the article in the South China Morning Post today.

“The global financial crisis has, no doubt, exacerbated the challenge of climate change,” Xie wrote. “But since climate change is a more far-reaching and serious challenge, the world must not waver in its determination and commitment to address it.”

China and the U.S., the largest emitters of climate-warming gases, have been at loggerheads over what actions to take under a new treaty to fight global warming that the United Nations aims to broker in December in Copenhagen.

Developing nations want industrialized countries to cut emissions 40 percent from 1990 levels by 2020. The U.S., concerned it would lose competitiveness, rejected the current accord, the Kyoto Protocol, because it set no goals for emerging economies.

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Last Updated: May 26, 2009 20:09 EDT