Climate Progress: An insider's view of climate science, politics, and solutions

What a contrast. In a year that’s on track to be our planet’s hottest on record, America turned “climate change” into a four-letter word that many U.S. politicians won’t even dare utter in public. If this were just some parlor game, it wouldn’t matter. But the totally bogus “discrediting” of climate science has had serious implications. For starters, it helped scuttle Senate passage of the energy-climate bill needed to scale U.S.-made clean technologies, leaving America at a distinct disadvantage in the next great global industry. And that brings me to the contrast: While American Republicans were turning climate change into a wedge issue, the Chinese Communists were turning it into a work issue.

The NYT’s Tom Friedman continues to do some of the best reporting on the economic consequences of the GOP decision to block even the most business-oriented Republican-originated strategies for averting catastrophic climate change and promoting clean energy jobs (see “Invented here, sold there”).

He has op-ed from Tianjin, China, “Aren’t we clever?” that is worth excerpting at length:

(more…)

Chinese protectionism of their clean energy market is a real problem, but one that we can cure with our own domestic investment, writes CAP’s Julian L. Wong in this cross-post.

(more…)

I would like to close with an observation that I gained from watching World Cup soccer over the past few weeks. In particular, I was struck by the recurring juxtaposition of two advertising billboards in the background of the soccer pitch, one in red by an American company—McDonald’s, the other in blue by a Chinese company—Yingli Solar. I thought to myself, this is the World Cup, the world’s biggest sporting stage, and China is proudly showcasing the future of its economy with a solar technology company. What is the U.S. best able to showcase?

Hamburgers.

I believe this image speaks volumes about the state of play not only in the global clean energy race, but also in the global competitiveness landscape. At the same time, I do believe there is a window of opportunity to do the right things to get America’s house in order so that it too can shape its energy future.

That’s from the oral testimony CAP’s Julian L. Wong gave to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission.  His excellent full written testimony is below:

(more…)

China’s rapidly growing economy is very quickly testing the limits of its resource constraints. While China is home to a quarter of the world’s population, it is endowed with disproportionately less arable land, oil and water.

Such natural resources are vital to any nation’s ability to be self-sufficient, but China’s predicament is especially dire not only because of its large population, but also its rapid urbanization and climate change, both of which will exert more intensive demands on food, energy and water supply. Yet, other than recognizing that water is essential for agriculture, the discussion of each resource constraint is often conducted in isolation, without paying heed to the inter-linkages of food, energy and water systems.

This article by CAP’s Julian L. Wong draws the connections among all three systems in China and makes the case for the urgent need for more integrated approaches to resource management. Julian is the author of The Green Leap Forward, a leading blog on China’s energy and environmental issues. This article was originally published in Harvard Asia Quarterly.

(more…)

CAP has sent a cohort of their experts into the field to China to study the rapidly expanding Chinese efforts to support clean energy R&D, innovation, manufacturing, and deployment. At one of their first stops on the tour, Julian Wong and Sarah Miller document how and why Serious Materials, a titan of Silicon Valley Innovation, has chosen to locate its new solar energy R&D facility in Xi’An province, instead of California.

(more…)

Much has been written over the past year about how other countries, particularly China, are investing heavily to increase their economic competitiveness by building domestic clean energy industries (see Lindsey Graham: “Every day that we delay trying to find a price for carbon is a day that China uses to dominate the green economy”).

Senior staff from the Center for American Progress will therefore be traveling to China to meet with policymakers and companies that are driving its aggressive pursuit of clean energy technology development.  They’ll share their findings with you on the CAP energy policy page.  Guest Blogger Julian L. Wong has the background on China and the trip.

(more…)

“China is going to eat our lunch and take our jobs on clean energy — an industry that we largely invented — and they are going to do it with a managed economy we don’t have and don’t want,” as I’ve said.  Our only chance of matching them is to pass the bipartisan climate and clean energy bill.

Two new articles underscore America’s challenge.  The first is a short Reuters piece on China’s new renewables law, and the second is a long New Yorker piece.  Reuters reported Sunday:

A new Chinese law requires power grid operators to buy all the electricity produced by renewable energy generators, in a move that will increase the proportion of energy that comes from renewable sources in coal-dependent China.

The amendment to the 2006 renewable energy law was adopted on Saturday by the standing committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s legislature, the Xinhua news agency said.

The amendment also gives authority to the State Council energy department, together with the State Council finance department and the state power authority, to “determine the proportion of renewable energy power generation to the overall generating capacity for a certain period.”

Such legislation is not how we do business, which is why, I repeat, “The only way to win the clean energy race is to pass the clean energy bill.”

The New Yorker piece is great news from the perspective of those who want to see widespread dissemination of low-cost low-carbon technology, but alarming to any American who understands that such technology will be the among the biggest source of high-wage jobs and economic power this century (see “Invented here, sold there”).  I recommend reading the whole  piece, but I’ll single out two must-read extended excerpts.  First, the overview:

(more…)