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When
it comes to controlling greenhouse gas emissions, China wants
in. The bold proclamation comes amidst international discussions that are
to take place in Copenhagen,
Denmark, in
December.
Its
intentions may be pure. But its motivations are even clearer. If the
country is to modernize its generation fleet, it needs investors. As such,
China must not only become an active partner in the fight to curb heat
trapping emissions but it also needs to attract at least $200 billion in
foreign investment over the next decade. Toward that end, it is asking the
developed world to share both its money and technology.
"In
a nutshell, China has
taken the climate change seriously, set clear goals and acted
vigorously," says Yu Qingtai,
China's climate
ambassador, at a recent press conference in Germany. "China's
energy consumption per-unit GDP has decreased by 10 percent from that in
2005, our target this year is another 5 percent drop." He says that
the country maintained its funding levels to achieve such goals even during
a recession.
China, by some standards, is now seen as the
world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases. With that understanding, it
has also said that man-made carbon dioxide emissions are the leading cause
of global warming. By year-end, it will update an earlier plan it had
enacted in 2006.
In
that year, China
released a blueprint to increase its renewable energy from 7.5 percent in
2005 to 10 percent in 2010. By 2020, the country says that sustainable
power will provide 15 percent of its electricity and by 2050 green fuels
will supply 30 percent.
China, meanwhile, is also working to cut its
energy consumption by using new conservation tools. It says energy
efficiency has increased by 20 percent over the past five years and that it
would like to achieve an additional 20 percent by 2020. Hydropower,
furthermore, now provides 25 percent of all power generated in China while
the country produces low-energy light bulbs that the rest of the world will
buy.
And
while the country emphasizes its vow to reducing its greenhouse gas
emissions, its climate ambassador says that it will neither make firm
commitments nor agree to any timelines. That's because China has
150 million people there who live on less than $2 a day. Until the nation
is able to free its people from poverty, it must balance its economic
growth objectives with those of cleaning its environment.
"The
large amount of greenhouse gases emitted through human activities is the
main reason for global warming leading to extreme weather events,"
says a report issued by the Chinese government at the conference in Germany. Such
adverse consequences, it adds, is "threatening the security of water
supplies."
Prominent
Seat
To
be sure, the world's most developed nations all went through their own
economic revivals around the middle of the last century. They weren't
consumed with the harmful effects of pollution until long after they had
the accumulated the wealth to address the problem. The United States,
for instance, enacted the original Clean Air Act in 1970 -- a law that is
given credit for greatly reducing pollutants.
China's growing economy, however, relies mostly
on coal. Critics of additional coal plant construction there argue that
multinational corporations must become more environmentally conscious. China's
potential, they add, will be limited unless it curbs the rate of emissions.
An analysis issued there not only warns of increased temperatures within
the country but also says that climate change would harm its ecology and
economy and perhaps contribute to a cut in production of wheat, corn and
rice by 37 percent.
The
Rainforest Action Network says that the priorities must lie in developing
responsible energy solutions that focus on efficiency technologies and
renewable sources such as wind and solar. It's a message that it is taking
to Wall Street, trying to persuade the big institutional investors that
bankroll the development of new coal generation to stop. If the use of coal
continues to rise in China,
the group says that the country will be locked into another 50 or 60 years'
worth of dirty fuel.
Like
India, China wants
the richer nations to lead the charge. China says that the developed
countries should cut their greenhouse gases by 40 percent below their 1990
levels by 2020. At the same time, it says that those countries should
provide the poorer ones the means to take similar steps. The developed
nations that signed on to the Kyoto Protocol, however, are struggling to
reach their initial 2012 emission targets but they are pledging to carbon
cuts of roughly 15 percent by 2020.
Under
the United Nation's Framework on Climate Change, China does not have to set
binding carbon emissions cuts -- an evaluation based on the fact that its
overall releases divided by its total population gives it a bye, for now.
But the forecast is that the economic growth to occur among developing
nations will be the leading source for heat-trapping emissions over the
next 20 years.
"If
China
could replace all its old technology with new, more efficient technology,
it could cut the growth of Chinese emissions by as much as half," says
Alan Oxley, chairman of World Growth, which is dedicated to fostering
economic growth while limiting emissions. "Unlike Kyoto, such reductions can be achieved
without stifling growth and penalizing business."
China is thus walking a tightrope as it tries
to rescue its people from poverty while also trying to appeal to the
industrialized world. A prominent seat at the international table would not
only allow it to showcase its efforts to wean itself from coal but to also
make its pleas for additional aid and technology so that it can continue
this pursuit.
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