The European Union and China are two key players in climate change politics, in terms of their huge contributions to, and their significant influence in, solving the problem. By tracing the development of the EU’s engagement with China in the background of global climate change governance, the paper finds out that past bilateral cooperation and dialogue between the EU and China have shown mixed impacts on the construction of a multilateral climate change regime. The paper argues that the EU’s approach of engaging with new rising players, particularly China, in moving the multilateral climate change negotiation forward should be improved to be more effective.