Tracking the emerging technological, commercial, political and social revolution that is greening China’s red-hot economy.
Posted in coal, policy, transportation, uncategorized on Oct 15th, 2008
Last week, we discussed the startling study by an MIT group on the Chinese coal industry. We dig a little deeper into the global coal industry (and of course tie it back to the Middle Kingdom), with a presentation by Stanford University’s David Victor at Google’s campus.
In case you don’t have that hour or so [...]
Posted in coal, policy, supply chain on Oct 9th, 2008
Coal-fired power plants account for some 70 to 80% of China’s total power generation. A group of MIT researchers have released a preliminary report on a comprehensive survey of China’s coal power plant industry entitled “Greener Plants, Grayer Skies: A Report from the Front Lines of China’s Energy Sector” (press release here; full report here), [...]
Posted in automotive, biofuels, climate change, coal, energy efficiency, government, green buildings, green hops, solar, transportation, uncategorized, urban planning on Oct 4th, 2008
BYD Auto/ Warren Buffet Update. Seems like the investment of Warren Buffet’s MidAmerican Energy Holdings in Shezhen-based BYD Auto is not just a bet on electric vehicles, but also on the collaboration between MidAmerican and BYD to develop “rapid charge batteries” for electrical grid systems to serve as energy storage for renewable but intermittent power [...]
Posted in automotive, climate change, coal, energy efficiency, government, green hops, policy, solar, transportation, water, wind on Sep 22nd, 2008
Cleantech news has been slow on The Green Leap Forward lately, so we play catchup on recent developments in the sector over the past two months…
Efficiency is King. Energy efficiency continues to be the clean energy policy priority of Beijing. New regulations governing energy efficiency in civil construction projects are on the cards, [...]
Posted in climate change, policy on Sep 9th, 2008
An influential voice from within calls for hard carbon emission targets.
A prominent policy academic has urged China to bind itself to carbon emission reductions. The substance of the academic’s message is not new–that as a (the?) world’s leading emitter of greenhouse gases, China should take active steps to curb emissions. What is new is that [...]
Posted in government, policy, wind on Sep 4th, 2008
I was recently interviewed by Social Bridges, a relatively new but excellent blog on sustainability and corporate social responsibility. The interview touched on various topics, including the following question on China (followed by my response):
Q: As your main focus is on China, what’s your take on the sustainability/greener efforts in your country and are you [...]
Posted in automotive, policy on Aug 29th, 2008
Earlier this spring this blog identified an upstart Chinese auto company called BYD Auto that is, despite is short operating history in the auto industry, introducing one of the most innovative automobile makes in the industry—a fully commercial electric car—ahead the likes of established auto giants like General Motors (and its flagship electric car make—the [...]
Posted in oil, policy, supply chain, transportation on Aug 14th, 2008
Just how real is China’s renewable energy revolution? It may be manufacturing a lot of cleantech goods, but the extent of domestic uptake leaves more to be desired. At the same time, global supply chains face the increasing strain of sustained high oil prices. What does the end of cheap oil, decades of [...]
Posted in capital and finance, coal, energy efficiency, green hops, nuclear, policy on Aug 7th, 2008
More on the Green Olympics. Just one more day to the opening ceremonies! In our last post, we examined some of the stopgap measures that Beijing embarked on to deliver on its Green Olympics promises. Louis Schwartz, one of my favorite commentators on China’s clean tech scene, provides some juicy details of the kinds of [...]
Posted in automotive, policy, transportation on Jul 18th, 2008
Organizers of the Beijing Olympics are boasting of all the renewable energy and water conservation technologies that are incorporated into the Olympic infrastructure, as well as the recent opening of the 680 hectre “green lung” in the form of the Olympic Forest Park.
But this wasn’t what anyone had in mind when Beijing pitched the [...]
