Have a BEER (or two) with BEN!
Some of our astute readers may have noticed in recent months some vague references to an organization called the Beijing Energy Network or the Beijing Energy & Environment Roundtable, e.g. here and here. Indeed it does exist, as The China Daily exposed yesterday.
[Right: Attendees of a recent Beijing Energy & Environment Roundtable (BEER) drinking up on green knowledge.]
To set record straight, the Beijing Energy Network (BEN or 北京能源网络) is a grassroots organization with a mission of promoting networking and collaboration amongst individuals and organizations from all walks to better understand, and to eventually start to take action in tackling, China’s energy and environmental challenge. As the China Daily article suggests, the early incarnations of BEN was founded in early 2008 with four guys (Brendan Acord, Jason Lee, Matt Durnin and myself) huddled around a hot pot dinner table in Gui Jie, Beijing. In its current form, the informal group adopted the generic moniker of BEN, but decided to jazz things up a bit by calling the now twice-monthly meet up sessions the Beijing Energy & Environment Roundtable (BEER or 北耳).
The BEER sessions are, as the acronym implies, happy hour sessions held in an informal bar setting to facilitate networking, but complemented with substantive presentations on current energy and environmental topics from members within BEN or externally, as organized by Brendan and myself. Recently, for instance, we had David Tyfield of Lancaster University speak to us about international low carbon collaboration, Julia Wu of New Energy Finance speak to us about China’s solar industry and Geoff Lewis of China Green Buildings discuss China green buildings. Allies and attendees of BEN/BEER also include the Green Brothers at China’s Green Beat, that Rhodes Scholar at China Green Space, and dozens of others working in energy companies (both green and brown), investment firms, non-governmental organizations, media, academia, and students of relevant majors.
Because learning is a big theme of these event, each BEER session is always accompanied by some “homework readings” relevant to the speaker’s topic and that are distributed together with the e-mail announcements (see for instance, below). While BEER is the flagship activity of BEN, the community platform may allow for further programs and activities for collaborative action.
The details of our next BEER event is as follows. So if you are in town, do join us! If you want to be put on the e-mail distribution list to stay abreast of events, follow the directions on the new BEN?BEER web page we have launched as a sub-page of this website here.
北京能源网络
Beijing Energy Network
presents
北耳
Beijing Energy & Environment Roundtable (BEER)
“柿子检软的吃：提高中国终端用户的用电效率”
“Picking The Low Hanging Fruit: Promoting End Use Energy Efficiency in China”
by
Dr. Li Yuqi, Director & Chief Engineer of the Demand Side Management
(DSM) Technical Center, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Beijing
Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 8:00 pm
The Blue Frog Bar (蓝蛙) at Sanlitun (三里屯) Village
4-3-1 * Floor 3nd, S4 Tower, South District of the Building * North
Sanlitun, New Sanlitun * Chaoyang District
北京市朝阳区三里屯路19号院4号楼3楼 * 4－3－1
Admission: Free!
Drinks: Discounted rate for BEER attendees
About the speaker (演讲人简介):
Li Yuqi has worked for Nanjing Turbine & Machinery Works, the Jiangsu Energy Conservation Center (1982-2006, Vice Chief Engineer), and most recently the NDRC/UNDP/GEF China End-Use Energy Efficiency Project (EUEEP) PMO (Executive Director & National Chief Technical Advisor). He has been responsible for many international energy cooperation projects, including the China-EU Energy Management Program (1982-2005), China-UNIDO Motor System Optimization Project (2002-2005), DSM & CDM program (2000-2005) and EUEEP project (2005-2008). Li Yuqi graduated from Tsinghua University and obtained a Professor Senior Engineer at Jiangsu Energy Conservation Center
Homework (功课):
- NDRC/UNDP/GEF End Use Energy Efficiency Project (EUEEP)
- World Bank white paper on need for demand side management (DSM) in China after the restructuring of the power sector:
January 15th, 2009 at 6:49 am
Excellent initiative. I’ll drop by next time I’m in Beijing. By the way, it’s too bad the naming starts with Beijing, because otherwise we could reproduce the same networking function (under the same name) in Shanghai or even Hong Kong, as well!
Reminds me of the “I&I” mixers during the good ol’ days of the dot-com boom!