The announcement from the two countries - the world’s largest carbon emitters - came as a surprise to delegates of COP26, the international climate change conference held in Glasgow over the last two weeks.
The framework agreement proposes a number of measures including cutting methane emissions, phasing out coal consumption and protecting forests.
US climate envoy John Kerry and his Chinese counterpart Xie Zhenhua made the announcement at COP26 just hours after the head of the United Nations conference said that the climate commitments pledged so far in the talks would do too little to tame climate change.
Kerry said: “The United States and China have no shortage of differences, but on climate co-operation is the only way to get this job done. This is not a discretionary thing, frankly, this is science, it’s maths and physics that dictate the road that we have to travel. And we cannot reach our goals unless all of us work together.
“Every country, China...