China Pushes Forward on Cleaner Coal Technologies
NYT has an interesting analysis of the development of cleaner coal technologies in China. Although China burns more coal than the US, Europe and Japan combined, and sits on the world’s third largest coal reserve (after the US and Russia), that country is becoming a leading developer of new cleaner coal technology. By using extremely hot steam in the generation process, their modern plants are able to dramatically increase efficiency and lower emissions (by potentially more than one-third).
However, despite these advancements, more than half of China’s coal plants are still antiquated and don’t even have emissions controls to remove sulfur compounds that cause acid rain. Additionally, of China’s new plants, only 60% are being built with the new and efficient, yet more expensive, technology.
But as the Times notes, “China’s improvements are starting to have an effect on climate models. In its latest annual report last November, the [International Energy Agency] cut its forecast of the annual increase in Chinese emissions of global warming gases, to 3 percent from 3.2 percent.”
While these incremental steps are not going to halt climate change alone, it is a sign that China is getting serious about developing clean technologies. Whether it is in order to save the environment, or to master this new and lucrative market, it should be a wake-up call to the US. If we don’t get our act together and begin leading the world in clean technologies, the world will quickly be leading us.
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Comments
One Comment on China Pushes Forward on Cleaner Coal Technologies
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Climatarians | Joost on
Tue, 14th Jul 2009 12:00 am
Hi it’s nice to see countries like China take the initiative towards creating cleaner and greener energy models. Of course, as your posts suggests, these are not sufficient to reverse the damage to the environment, but for a start this is a good sign and a step in the right direction. If they increase the pace and widen the realm affected by such reforms, it would be a good thing.
Thanks for the information.
Joost Hoogstrate
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