We don't do this often, but in today's podcast, we address some breaking news: President Xi Jinping's announcement that China will peak carbon emissions before 2030 and set a new goal of net-neutral carbon emissions by 2060. The speech delivered remotely to the United Nations during Climate Week caught the energy and climate watchers by surprise.
In this mini-podcast, recorded less than 24 hours after the announcement, host Anders Hove gathered three top energy and climate experts (and long-time Beijing Energy Network speakers) for a short and rapid-fire panel discussion:
Li Shuo is a senior global policy analyst at Greenpeace East Asia.
Lauri Myllyvirta is a lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air.
Kaare Sandholt is a chief expert at the China National Renewable Energy Centre, at the NDRC Energy Research Institute.
To keep the show notes brief, here are the items mentioned or referenced by the guests:
For further reading:
The China National Renewable Energy Centre's China Renewable Energy Outlook (full version, may not work in certain browsers:
http://boostre.cnrec.org.cn/index.php/2020/03/30/china-renewable-energy-outlook-2019-2/?lang=en;
executive summary:
https://www.dena.de/fileadmin/dena/Publikationen/PDFs/2019/CREO2019_-_Executive_Summary_2019.pdf)
CREO's 2050 Below 2 Degree scenario anticipates non-fossil energy reaching 65% of primary energy (26% wind, 18% solar, 8% nuclear, 6% hydro, 8% other RE).
Under this scenario, China would ramp up from installing around 40 GW of solar and 35 GW wind in recent years to 60 GW of solar and 55 GW wind in the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025), eventually peaking annual installations at 150 GW each wind and solar in 2031-2035), and finally reaching around 2,000 GW of wind and solar in the late 2030s. (China currently has over 200 GW each of wind and solar installed.)
See also various publications using the China-SWITCH model, such as Enabling a Rapid and Just Transition Away from Coal," One Earth, 2020 at
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7442150/
and "Rapid cost decrease of renewables and storage accelerate the decarbonization of China’s power system," Nature, 2020, at
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16184-x.
Lauri mentions his recent article on China's COVID recovery investments and how they break down by high-carbon versus low-carbon:
https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-covid-stimulus-plans-for-fossil-fuels-three-times-larger-than-low-carbon
Kaare mentions Document #9 on the Deepening Reform of the Power Sector. You can read more about that 2015 policy here:
https://www.raponline.org/blog/a-new-framework-for-chinas-power-sector/
This episode was produced by Anders Hove and edited by Veronica Spurna.
《環境中國》是北京能源網絡最新成立的中英雙語播客欄目，已經發布了78集。在每一期節目中，我們將請到中外環保領域的倡導人士、創業者以及行業專家，與大家暢談環保。在環保這個時下萬眾矚目的領域中，他們每個人都在用創新策略與獨到見解，通過實際行動，為環境問題提供著積極的解決方案。您只需打開Podcast，搜索環境中國「Environment China」節目，就能收聽到我們的節目。歡迎大家的收聽！
So far Environment China has released 78 episodes. You can listen to them on your podcast provider (iTunes, iPhone Podcast, Libsyn, Stitcher) or simply look up 「Environment China」 on the Podcast app that comes with your iPhone. Environment China will post a new episode through our channels every two weeks.
If you are interested in getting involved or have an idea for an interview, please reach out to us at Environmentchina@outlook.com 如果您想加入我們的播客製作團隊或者有好的話題想推薦，請隨時發電子郵件至 Environmentchina@outlook.com
The Environment China Team
《環境中國》製作團隊
The Beijing Energy Network (BEN) is a professional network with a mission of promoting knowledge sharing, networking, and collaboration in understanding and tackling China’s energy and environmental challenges.
The flagship activities of BEN are the Beijing Energy & Environmental Roundtable (BEER), an approximately twice-monthly happy hour/speaker series, BEN Reading Group, which is held once a month to discuss a recently published policy document or report, often with the author or an expert in the field present, and Environment China, a bilingual podcast featuring conversations with advocates, entrepreneurs, and experts working in the environmental field in China.
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