CHINA STILL WANTS NEW ENERGY

China clings to clean-up amid economic woes
Emma Graham-Harrison (w/Alex Richardson), March 5, 2009 (Thomson Reuters)

"Grappling with slowing growth and a rising tide of unemployment, China is still pushing for cleaner development and may step up efforts to tackle climate change, the country's top economic planner said…Experiments with a cap-and-trade emissions trading system for air pollutants, more spending on technology to tackle global warming and another round of shutdowns at outdated power plants and factories are all on the agenda…

"The election of a new U.S. president with a strong position on global warming, and a looming deadline for a world deal on fighting climate change, have focused attention on China as the world's top emitter of greenhouse gasses…But some experts have voiced fears that the global downturn will test the resolve of China and other leading emitters to fight global warming…"

click to enlarge

"Beijing, in turn, is worried about its reliance on imported oil and gas, the health and economic consequences of its murky air and water and risks of protests and unrest from citizens threatened by pollution and now also unhappy about the economy…

"A long-standing drive to cut wasteful energy use remained a focus of attention with pledges to improve management of power demand, fine-tune pricing of oil products and block construction of new power-hungry projects…[T]argeted measures include income tax rebates for purchase of energy efficient equipment and tax credits for the manufacture of small, environmentally friendly cars."

click to enlarge

"The effort to improve "energy intensity" was actually speeded up by the economic downturn, which helped China to achieve a self-imposed energy-saving target for the first time in 2008, by pushing dirty metal firms and factories over the edge…

"…[O]fficials have said in the past that a scheme for these gasses could lay the ground for a system tackling greenhouse pollutants such as carbon dioxide by putting monitoring equipment in place, building up a market and popularising the concept of emissions trading…The government also plans to set climate change programmes for each province…Beijing has called for rich nations to provide green technology to developing countries as part of a global pact to cut emissions of global warming gasses, due to be hammered out at talks in Copenhagen in December…"