Abstract: This paper overviews the new set of integrated scenarios, representative concentration pathways (RCPs), provided by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for the fifth assessment process, analyzes the advantages of new approaches to scenarios development, and depicts the characteristics of the identified four RCPs (RCP8.5, RCP6, RCP4.5 and RCP3-PD). By using the RCPs database updated by IPCC, the paper analyzes the global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, regional emissions and emission abatement costs under the high, intermediate-range and low RCP scenarios. More importantly, the paper investigates the relationship between low RCP and keeping the global temperature rise below 2℃, identifies the challenges brought to China, and presents China’s countermeasures for addressing the challenges.