China’s green opportunity: from McKinsey
McKinsey’s article ‘China’s green opportunity’ identifies five major categories of energy efficiency and greenhouse gas–abatement opportunities that China could implement between now and 2030. If China pursued them successfully, it could reduce its dependence on imported oil by up to 30 percent more than the 30 percent reduction it currently hopes to achieve. The country could also stabilize coal demand at current levels, substantially reducing the proportion of electric power generated by using this fossil fuel, to 34 percent by 2030, down from 80 percent today. These efforts could enable China to hold its greenhouse gas emissions to roughly eight gigatons by 2030—roughly 10 percent higher than 2005 levels—without hindering growth. This would amount to nothing less than a green revolution in China.
The five categories are green power, green transport, green industry, green buildings and green ecosystem. Go to the full article here for details.
Related to this theme, Yale Environment 360 recently published an illuminating update, entitled ‘China’s Grand Plans for Eco-cities Now Like Abandoned’. It suggests that the way forward for China may lie more in little steps like enforcing green building codes, than in building greenfield eco-cities. If interested, see http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2138
shirleyloo
June 2, 2009 at 11:33 am