The Canberra Times/AFP has the alarming news:
China is aiming to increase its coal production by about 30 per cent by 2015 to meet its energy needs, the Government has announced, in a move likely to fuel concerns over global warming.
[Note to Canberra Times: Some statements are so obvious you can skip the journalistic hedging.]
Land and Resources Ministry chief planner Hu Cunzhi said the Government planned to increase annual output to more than 3.3 billion tonnes by 2015.
That is up from the 2.54 billion tonnes produced in 2007, according to the ministry.
In short, from 2007 to 2015, China will increase its coal production by an amount equal to two-thirds of the entire coal consumption of the United States — an amount that surpasses all of the coal consumed today in Europe, Eurasia, the Middle East, Africa, and Central and South America.
Such is the legacy of 8 years of the Bush administration blocking all national and international action on climate change, and indeed actively working to undermine international negotiations by creating a parallel do-nothing track for countries like China. As Chinese officials have told me, we gave them the cover to accelerate emissions growth.
Some might claim a different president would never havebeen able to get China on a different path. But if Al Gore had been elected picked by the Supreme Court in 2000, I assert that China would not be planning for its 2015 coal production to be triple that of current U.S. coal production.
Changing China’s rapacious coal plans will arguably be Obama’s single greatest challenge in terms of preserving a livable climate and thus the health and well-being of future generations and thus any chance at a positive legacy for his presidency (see “What will make Obama a great president, Part 2: A climate deal with China”
The story continues:
Annual production of natural gas would more than double to 160 billion cubic metres by 2015, while that of crude oil would increase by 7 per cent to more than 200billion tonnes, Mr Hu said.
The Government would set up reserves of oil and coal as part of its efforts to ensure national energy security, Mr Hu said at a news conference.
China began building four strategic oil reserve facilities on its east coast this decade, and two of these are now in operation.
The country’s energy consumption expanded by an average annual rate of 5.4 per cent between 1979 and 2007, the official Xinhua news agency said yesterday, which fuelled average annual economic growth of 9.8 per cent.
China depends on coal for about 70 per cent of its energy.
Its thundering growth has meant the country has become one of the two biggest emitters of greenhouse gases, alongside the United States.
China said coal, the cheapest and most plentiful source of fuel in the country, would remain its main energy source, despite the impact global warming had already had on the country.
China has repeatedly defended its use of coal, pointing to its efforts to develop renewable energies while blaming industrialised countries for the bulk of the greenhouse gases that are already doing the damage. It also emphasises the per capita emissions of greenhouse gases of China, the world’s most populous country with more than 1.3 billion people, are far lower than those of the US and other developed nations.
That Chinese argument, I think, can now be officially labeled the insanity defense (see Hadley Center: “Catastrophic” 5-7°C warming by 2100 on current emissions path). Yes, the industrialized countries must sharply reduce their emissions — but absent a reversal of this Chinese coal policy, catastrophic climate impacts are inevitable.
[Note: I changed the headline from "single-handedly destroy the climate." Must give credit where credit is deserved to the rich countries for putting the climate in a position where China can finish it off.]
Related Posts:
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- Can China go green?
- Who will be the biggest obstacle to climate action in the next decade — China, Russia, India, or us?
- Is it the end of the line for coal-to-oil in China?
- Chapter Nine Excerpt: The U.S.-China Suicide Pact on Climate
- Are China’s Carbon Emissions China’s?
- Taking on the “China Excuse” for inaction
- Bush-like doubletalk from Chinese foreign minister
- China’s immoral energy policy — Part II: The efficient alternative
- The immorality of China’s coal policy is breathtaking (literally) — Part I
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One thought…
Archer and Jacobson might be talking about 8,000 North American sites. Some parts of the world are wind poor. But I don’t think that’s what they said.
The linked page is a poorly written summary. I think you have to pay to get the full article.
Yep. $15 or free to AAAS membership. I let my membership lapse long ago when I retired (or maybe earlier when I drifted off into management).
Anyone got access?
Joe: I am glad you remain clear-headed about China. There is no doubt that China is making an effort with respect to renewables and energy efficiency. It could do significantly more in these areas if it thought it had to. There is also no doubt that China is playing a very skilful game to boost its “green” credentials (with considerable success–a commenter in this thread apparently believes that “MEP has been busy approving projects for China’s own version of the green economic stimulus”), and confirm its “developing nation” status (is that China there hiding behind Haiti?).
The story which forms the basis for this post should help those who have been seduced by the glint from a Chinese solar project realize that basically it’s still business as usual in China. A 30% increase in coal production from 2008 to 2015 works out to an annualized average increase of 3.75%. Assuming this increased production is thermal coal, as the article suggests, and coal fires about 70% of China’s electricity production, this works out to an increase in generation of about 5.35% on an average annual basis. This is remarkably is close to the 5.4% average annual rate of increase in energy consumption between 1979 and 2007, as reported in the article you cite.
China will not be brought easily to the negotiating table and once it’s there it won’t be forthcoming unless there is a large stick lurking somewhere in the background. I hope that soon after January 20 the US will engage China in serious and credible efforts to end the status quo of mutually assured destruction.
China -
Anyone remember a country that recognized the problem of a too rapidly expanding population and did something about it?
Who was it that implemented the One Child Policy?
Astroid – ask and ye shall receive (sometimes)
Email reply from Mark Jacobson Jan 11 09
“We developed the first and only map of the world’s winds from data alone at the height of modern turbines, 80 m,
http://www.stanford.edu/ group/ efmh/ winds/ global_winds.html
and found the global delivered potential over land at locations where the mean annual wind speed is > 6.9 m/s (about 15% of land outside of Antarctica) is about 72 TW, which is on the order of 35 times the global electricity use. More recently, we have done a modeling study and found that this number is conservative, and may be ~ 100 TW.
Any other number you see anywhere is not based on data. The site you refer to specifically does not even show land wind energy, and even the ocean values are not based on in situ data. In fact, it sounds like they are just making a general statement consistent with many renewable portfolio standards, not based on actual potential.”
This is a fascinating topic.
One think everyone needs to understand about the PRC: they are employing EVERY type of electrical generation, bar none. Quite literary the first with public bicycle battery generators to actually, THIS YEAR, deploying Generation IV Nuclear reactors (PBMRs, Chinese version).
They will adding close to 30 more GWs of hydro over the next 10 years (maybe double that). The 100 nuclear reactors mentioned above comes out to 160 GWs by 2030. They are looking at 16% of their power generated by nuclear (ALL of which would be produced by coal if not atoms).
I follow their nuclear industry the closest and have written about it on the Daily Kos. I’ve talked with PRC energy decision makers over the last year. A few things to note:
1. Their labor costs are about 1/12 of that of the US. Since labor is more than half the costs of a nuclear power plant (10 to 20 million man-hours for the ever popular AP1000, for example) the Chinese are bringing in their nukes at under $1800 KW installed.
2. They have lots of money and they assure me that part of the 500 Billion USD stimulus package includes all manner of energy, indigenously produced (meaning vertically integrated energy businesses from wind mills to nuclear).
3. The Chinese see nuclear and hydro as their *main* way of combating CO2 emissions.
What I get from their people who visit the SF-Bay Area where I live, is that they see nuclear as THE primary way to solve a host of problems. To wit:
1. Health. The issue of climate change is a sort of ’secondary’ issue for the Chinese. Coal production and use of it kills close to 400,000 people a year there. The savings in this, both human and financial would be huge by a switch to nuclear.
2. The Chinese rail system is fraught with ‘weakness’ do to the geographic location of where the coal is mined…in the north, and to where it needs to be used, in the south. They are “always upgrading” their rail but snows, natural disasters, have shown the severe limitations of rail. So they are addressing this two ways.
a). They ARE importing more coal. If you think this is not true, due a search of Australia’s coal industry, write them, and ask them what they think. The Chinese are *planning* huge, exponential increases of coal importation from everywhere they can buy it, including the US, South Africa and India.
b). Building more nukes. Nuclear is easier for them. They have, in 2008, 3 times increased their 2020 goal from 40GWs (as part of the original 11th Year plan) to 50GWs then 60GWs and now, 70GWs.
3. And more nukes…again. So, the 2030 goal of “160GWs” is probably low. They are quite open, especially officials from the big utilities in the south of China, about “if we can”, we would go to 80% nuclear or, 900 GWs by 2050 (expected load –as opposed to capacity– of 1200 GWs). I asked “do you see the amounts increasing over the 12th Year Plan (2010-2015) in terms of projecting out to 2030?” Yes, they replied. This was BEFORE the announcements last year of immediate 2020 goals of 70 GWs.
So the conclusion is that the Chinese are clear about reducing CO2 and fly ash, and particulate even though it’s *secondary* to maintaining their 7 to 9% growth rates. They see nuclear (and all non-carbon producing electrical generation) as a main way to reduce overall emissions.
David
Stephen Chu’s confirmation hearing starts tomorrow in front of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Climate Science Watch submitted some questions, one of which pertains to Chinese coal fired power generation emissions, if you accept that the developed world should lead on developing carbon capture and storage technology and help finance its transfer to the developing world to reduce the emissions resulting from coal use:
Climate Science Watch question “4) The poor way the Energy Department under the Bush administration handled R&D on carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) for coal combustion, including the late-stage cancellation of FutureGen, has caused needless delays in resolving critical issues germane to determining the viability of this climate mitigation option. How do you plan to expedite an R&D program needed to ascertain the feasibility of CCS in a timely enough manner to avert the disastrous climate change consequences we are facing?”
So perhaps Chu will have to take a stand on the Obama administration attitude to carbon capture and storage soon.
Chu spoke recently about more than 150 coal plants on the drawing boards in the US, which he said could mean the US intends to build one plant every ten days compared to the often quoted China figure of one every week.
Chu spoke recently about more than 150 coal plants on the drawing boards in the US, which he said could mean the US intends to build one plant every ten days compared to the often quoted China figure of one every week.
One can hope this is the Chinese seeing climate negotiations coming and wanting to set themselves up for as easy a play in the negotiations as possible.