Aggressive energy-saving program 

When he was told that almost 40 percent of China's four trillion-yuan economic stimulus package had gone to green projects, Secretary Locke said Wednesday in Beijing to the American Chamber of Commerce and the U.S.-China Business Council, "China has already adopted the most aggressive energy-efficiency program in the entire world, and they are on track to exceed many of their renewable energy adoption goals."

China and the U.S. kicked off last week a joint research center on clean energy, with an initial funding of 15 million U.S. dollars for research and development mainly on energy-efficient buildings, clean coal use and clean-fueled vehicles.

State enterprises like the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC) and the Dongfeng Motor Corporation (DMC), as well as private companies such as Chery and BYD invested substantial funds into developing hybrid and fuel-cell vehicles. The research and development of these vehicles are subsidized by the government in order to ensure market competitiveness and are supported by he Ministry of Science and Technology and pushed by Minister Wan Gang, an engineering doctorate who was trained in Germany and has long been a hybrid-car expert.

The ministry channeled more funds into research on solar, biomass and wind energies. China is a solid sponsor for the International Thermo-nuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), a pioneer multinational collaboration for finding new and clean energy.

At a meeting of leaders from five developing countries' leaders on July 8 in Italy, State Councilor Dai Bingguo urged developed countries to "make an explicit commitment to take the lead in emissions reductions and provide developing countries with measurable, reportable and verifiable support in technology, funding and capacity building."

He made the remarks on behalf of Hu Jintao who could not attend the meeting due to the incident in Xinjiang.

Stavins, who directs the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements, said, "The ongoing dialogue between China and the United States is particularly important."

The American environmental economist, however, suggested capital markets should place more emphasis on supporting competitive cutting-edge environmental technologies.

"Technological transfer will surely be a major part of any future international climate regime that is meaningful, but the most effective way for it to be included will be through market-based incentives for private-sector investment in the developing world," he said.

Freestone of the George Washington University said, "'No-lose' targets would be voluntary undertakings perhaps sector by sector, energy, etc., and their success would depend on financial flows and investments from the west."

Chinese technologists are eager to develop indigenous methods of reducing greenhouse gases emissions. A research team at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry created a giant device that was able to collect and cool coal-bed gas from coal pits.

Before the device was tested in Yangquan and Jincheng, both big coal fields in north China's Shanxi Province, methane, the dominant ingredient in most coal-bed gas combination, was usually not recycled. This would often trigger coal pit explosions, or pollution as it was vented into the air.

The CAS experiment attracted 10 million yuan in private investments to commercialize methane, a byproduct of coal burning that is cleaner than traditional fuels.

Using the huge refrigerator-like device, lead engineer Zhang Wu said, his team froze the combined coal-bed gas under 200 degrees Celsius below zero, and separated methane, oxygen and nitrogen from each other thanks to their different evaporation points.

"The technology not only produces commercialized methane, but also helps reduce greenhouse effect resulting from randomly emitting methane to the air," Zhang said.

(Xinhua News Agency July 21, 2009)