Amid ‘hazardous’ air, China tries low-carbon path
Posted: Thursday, August 20, 2009 1:06 PM
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Beijing, China
By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
BEIJING – For most of August, it’s been hard to imagine China leading the charge down a low-carbon path.
On my Blackberry, headlines about how the country is seeking to ramp up development of alternative energies such as wind and solar power and rolling out electric vehicles have been competing all summer with relentless Tweets from BeijingAir telling us the obvious: That air quality in the Chinese capital is "unhealthy" or "hazardous."
(BeijingAir is a Twitter feed published by the U.S. embassy in Beijing, which monitors the air in the central downtown area, on an hourly basis, using U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards.)
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| Adrienne Mong / NBC News |
| BeijingAir publishes hourly tweets on the capital's air quality. |
Last weekend’s weather was so foul (BeijingAir: "very unhealthy") that I stayed indoors, engrossed in reading a political thriller that pits the U.S. against China over climate change.
"Ultimatum," a novel that came out earlier this year, is set in the year 2032, when a newly elected American president discovers that the effects of global warming will be far more catastrophic than anyone realized.
With huge swathes of America’s coastline – as well as those of every other continent – destined to go under water, forcibly relocating hundreds of millions of people, the U.S. realizes any viable solution requires a coordinated effort with the world’s biggest emitter, China. And so begins a secret, high-stakes diplomatic game of cat and mouse…
Carbon emissions: ‘A zero sum game’
In an email exchange, the novel’s U.K.-based author, who goes by pseudonym Matthew Glass, told me that he was inspired to pen the novel in part because "the evolving relationship between the U.S. and China will be the most powerful driver of international events over the coming half century."
And Glass imagines that conflict between the two countries will arise over the control of carbon emissions. As it stands now, both are believed responsible for producing 40 percent of the pollutants linked to climate change.
Glass believes that, "in the area of emissions control, the two powers are locked in a true zero sum game. If one emits more, the other must emit less, and vice versa. This puts them on a collision path, the outline of which is already becoming visible as we approach [the U.N. Climate Change talks at] Copenhagen."
Of course, "Ultimatum" is just a novel. But some of the points raised in the book make it a good read for anyone needing an entertainingly packaged refresher (or primer) on the 1997 Kyoto Protocol – especially just months ahead of its successor – the U.N. Climate Change Conference that will be held in Copenhagen this December.
Developed versus developing
For one, there’s the "common but differentiated responsibilities" stance advocated by China and other developing countries.
One of the major challenges for Kyoto was the notion that countries such as China and the U.S. are at different stages of development so each country should play different, commensurate roles in combating climate change. Moreover, developed countries have more obligations than developing ones as they industrialized first.
"This was a common impasse we used to come to," said Sam Geall, deputy editor at China Dialogue, a bilingual Web site that exchanges views and responses to environmental concerns with a heavy emphasis on China.
"Chinese intellectuals or people you engaged with on this subject, their attitude was, ‘You got rich and now who are you to say that we can’t develop the same way,’ which would shut down the conversation right away."
But what’s interesting is where real life has departed from Glass’s novel. Not only have those same Chinese detractors changed their tune – perhaps, said Geall, helped by the increasing number of natural disasters, like the freak winter ice storms of 2008 – but the Chinese leadership has also exhibited signs of becoming more flexible on its stance over an emissions cap.
Last week, a senior Chinese climate change policymaking official said their emissions would peak at 2050 and that they would not "continue growing emissions without limit."
Next week, lawmakers in Beijing will debate a new resolution and amendment to its renewable energy law. Although details are not forthcoming, news of this debate follows last month’s publication of an 894-page think tank report, "2050 China Energy and CO2 Emissions Report," that supports aggressive policies to improve energy efficiency that will allow for emissions to fall by 2030. The authors of the report also advise the Chinese government to invest an average of $147 billion each year into developing low-carbon technologies until 2050.
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| Adrienne Mong / NBC News |
| At nearly 900 pages, the "2050 China Energy and CO2 Emissions Report" is a guide of sorts for policymakers, researchers, and scholars. |
A market opportunity
"China sees economic opportunities in the clean energy space," said Charlie McElwee, a Shanghai-based environmental lawyer from the U.S.
He believes that authorities "see a chance that, given China’s huge needs in this area, [if they] pump enough public funds into it, you can produce national champions to help with their innovation and tap into a growing market worldwide."
And the Chinese have a very high-profile champion. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair visited Beijing this week and praised China for its momentum on developing and commercializing a range of low-carbon technologies. "They’re really down to specific policy measures on renewable energy," he told NBC News.
The market opportunities sometimes seem to outweigh environmental concerns. As McElwee noted, Chinese officials appear more focused on, say, increasing wind power capacity instead of shutting down polluting lead smelters. Just this week alone, separate reports emerged of nearly 2,000 children found with lead poisoning from two polluting metal factories in two provinces.
China’s jumpstart in the low-carbon technology race, however, isn’t simply a business opportunity. It’s also about power.
"[The Chinese] see this as power politics in its rawest form," said Jonathan Watts, a Beijing-based correspondent for the Guardian newspaper who writes about the environment.
"They can see that the way these climate talks develop will shape who has authority, power, the ability to develop in the future. For that reason, they should try to use them. For that reason, they cannot afford to ignore them or to be seen as the villain."
That only works in thriller novels.
