Abstract: Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged on behalf of the Chinese government at the UN General Assembly’s seventy-fifth session that China is making goals of having CO₂ emissions peak before 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2060 (the ‘dual carbon goals’). Why is it essential to achieve the dual carbon goals? How could the goals be achieved? And what contribution could the water sector make to the goals? This paper makes an in-depth discussion. Due to greenhouse gas emissions that lead to a warming climate, it’s unequivocal that substantial changes have taken place in earth’s atmosphere, ocean and terrestrial systems, which poses a dire challenge to human existence and ecological sustainability. Under global climate change, China is also challenged in its water security, natural disaster control, public health and food security. As water is closely related to climate change, to mitigate the risks, the water sector could contribute to the ‘dual carbon goals’ through promoting hydropower, developing pumped storage hydropower, improving small hydropower, and exploiting geothermal energy.