Posted by: Earl
on Feb 22, 2009
This is the second installment of Earl’s China Energy Adventure.
Can you imagine getting everyone in the US to change their attitude about energy conservation and recycling? Can the government make it happen? It’s been said that democracy is the least efficient form of government and a dictatorship the most efficient. A one-party, communist government in China is not exactly a dictatorship but it’s a lot more efficient at implementing regulations and getting people to follow their mandates. I’m certainly not advocating this system but it is interesting to observe what they are doing about their energy demand and pollution.
In the continuing saga of Earl’s Chinese Energy Adventure, Earl can’t go anywhere in China without continually seeing signs of green activity. I bought a few snacks and bottles of water (you still don’t want to drink tap water) from the local Carrefour store and had to buy the plastic bag to carry back to the hotel. I’ve heard that the plastic bags are going to be banned entirely very soon. There are billboards and signs on the sides of buses reminding people to conserve and recycle to improve their quality of life.
According to China Business Weekly, the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) is promoting a project to put 5,000 hybrids, 20,000 hybrid taxis, and 5,000 electric vehicles on the streets in 30 cities by 2012. Estimates are that the project will save 780M liters of gasoline avoid emission of 2.3M tons of carbon dioxide. A MOST representative stated that “the core aim of a low-carbon economy is to increase energy efficiency and change the structure of energy consumption”.
This low-carbon economy is already making progress in both primary cities like Beijing and secondary cities (not readily recognizable by westerners but big cities by our standards). More than half of the world’s population live in urban areas with these areas contributing to 75% of the greenhouse gas emissions it is especially important to make the cities greener. Mega cities like Beijing and Shanghai are showcasing their efforts at events like last year’s Olympic Games and Shanghai’s upcoming environmentally friendly World Expo 2010.
China’s current air quality deserves the bad reputation it has gotten but, to be fair, the Chinese recognize the importance of cleaning up their act to the benefit of everyone. They've got a long way to go but Earl is impressed with the effort underway.
Posted by: Earl
on Feb 14, 2009
Your intrepid energy explorer is reporting this week from China. You’ve heard about the bad air no doubt. It’s no exaggeration. In an interior city, Changsha in the Hunan Province, a taxi driver was only partially joking today that he’d been living in the city for 4 years and had only seen a blue sky 3 times.
That said, it is no exaggeration that the Chinese government and people know they have a problem and are going to great lengths and great expense to improve the situation. The government has set aside 1 trillion yuan (~$150B – that’s B as in billion) to improve the situation. This isn’t future money, this is cash set aside for spending on improving the energy infrastructure; power distribution and improving efficiency.
The China Daily, about the only newspaper Earl can read over here, had a section in the 10 February edition on Energy/Environment. The section titled Mixed Energy Forecast gave an assessment on renewable energy. Here is a synopsis on what was reported about the gains made as a result of the Renewable Energy Law that has been implemented.
- Investment in wind power in 2008 was 88% greater than 2007 investment growing the wind output by 4GW to 10GW total.
- Nuclear power infrastructure investment increased 72% in 2008 over 2007
- The global financial crisis will cause a decline in investment in 2009
- The Chinese government has promised to offer more support to the renewable energy industry
- Several large hydro electric projects came on line adding 20.1 GW to the 2008 hydro output. In addition to the massive Three Gorges project there are 10s of thousands of micro-hydro stations throughout rural China.
- The bad news is that there is an absence of incentive policies for the solar industry. There are currently more than 70 grid-connected to photovoltaic projects but only two of them received feed-in tariffs and most have not benefitted from the Renewable Energy Law.
- Nuclear power goals have recently been increased with plan to bring total nuclear generated electricity to 5% of the demand by 2020.
The paper also reported that from October 2007 to June 2008 subsides of 2B yuan (~$22M) were provided to 148 renewable energy projects. This indicates that these projects are definitely gaining momentum. The global financial crisis has brought down global demand for raw materials such as steel and silicon. This is good news for the renewable energy industry bringing down costs for wind turbine and solar panel manufacturers. The net result of this is lower prices around the world. Stay tuned for more reports.
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