Interview: German expert on China's progress in energy efficiency and circular economy
"China is perceived as a polluter in Europe,but things have changed a lot," said a German expert. The question is Can China and the EU, particularly Germany, learn from each other and collaborate?
Greetings and welcome to the latest edition of PekingEnsight! We're thrilled to have you join us once again as we navigate the ever-evolving landscape of the Chinese economy.
In this edition of Peking Ensight, Ren Ke and Han Qiao are honored to talk to Prof. Raimund Bleischwitz, a German expert on China’s energy development, with a particular focus on energy efficiency and the circular economy.
In his signed article titled "Recycling nation Germany? China shows how it can be done much better," Prof. Bleischwitz. brought up some interesting points.
China is perceived as a polluter in Europe, but things have changed a lot. Now China can produce much more GDP with much less energy consumption, and its CO2 emission is about to peak. Germany can learn a lot from China when it comes to the circular economy. In addition, Germany, as well as the EU, could cooperate with China successfully in this area.
Prof. Bleischwitz's article was first published in the newsletter service Table.Media and later in one of Germany's major news web portals FOCUS Online.
Prof. Bleischwitz is Scientific Director of the Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research (ZMT) in Bremen, Germany, and Professor for Global Sustainable Resources at the University of Bremen. For many years he has been working on the circular economy with Shanghai Jiaotong University and colleagues in China and has advised the European Commission and the British government.
Some Chinese people translated Prof. Bleischwitz's article into Chinese and the article was widely shared among people from various sectors, including energy, environmental protection, and media, among others. A magazine also introduced this article. People are interested in this article, not because he said something positive about China, but because Prof. Bleischwitz noticed some changes in China's sustainable development that few foreign or even Chinese people have noticed.
That’s why we contacted Prof. Bleischwitz and had a Zoom interview with him. Based on his article, Prof.Bleischwitz shared his views on China's development in sustainable development, climate change efforts, progress in circular economy, and the concept of ecological civilization(生态文明)put forward by China.
Prof. Bleischwitz's key points:
China's resource productivity has doubled since 1990 and its energy efficiency has risen too, thus lowering environmental pollution and carbon emissions, which is expected to peak in a not distant future. China's practices, such as eco-industrial parks, can be learned by Europe to scale up successful innovations. China can also learn from the EU in agro-photovoltaic system, better construction standards, etc. Germany, as well as EU, can cooperate in standard setting, establishing common databases, policies and carbon markets coordination, and academics with China.
Q: What are you interested in regarding China's energy and environmental protection policies and practices? Would you like to share some observations that might be unknown or unfamiliar to ordinary people outside China?
A: What is really impressive is that China CO2 emissions now seem to reach a turning point. China has set the goal of achieving climate neutrality by the year 2060 and the changes are happening. We know that China is now the worldwide largest investor in photovoltaic and renewable energy. It is impressive that China has the largest production capacity worldwide. China has also become world market leader in electric vehicles which is also impressive.
So we look forward to seeing China reach a peak in the emissions, either now or in one or two years and then a decline in the CO2 emissions. That is a major change, which is relevant for all countries and people around the world.
Tackling both CO2 emissions and environmental protection and retaining them are important. China does it. What is in particular important is the efforts at urban scale. Chinese cities, especially the large megacities, are becoming not only climate neutral, but also clean in terms of air pollution. That is something where China has been pretty active. And it needs to continue, because the level of air pollution and CO2 emissions have been high, if not too high.
Q: Could you please compare the circular economy policies and practices between China and the EU? What lessons can each region learn from the other?
A: One of the things we've learned is that the circular economy has a long tradition in China. It started more than 20 years ago, and so did it in Germany back then in the 90s. For Europe, the Netherlands and Germany are spearheading, but China has been impressive. It has doubled its resource productivity since 1990. Using fewer natural resources while increasing the GDP, this is something that China has managed very well.
China did it also very strongly in energy efficiency. China has more than tripled the use of secondary materials in the economy, but there is still a long way to go. We believe that the current circularity rate in China is about 10 percent, and it's like 16 to 17 percent in countries like Germany.
For many countries, there is still a long way to go by increasing the rate of secondary materials and close loops through new business models. One thing is that energy and circular economy could be combined is the more circular design of renewable energy technologies. That will benefit both China and Europe. Make wind turbines, blades, photovoltaic sets and other components reused, and recover rare earth elements, carbon fibers and others. That will benefit many countries, because China is the largest exporter of those technologies and items.
If China comes up with an eco-design that is clear what materials are in there, like a material passport for those renewable energy technologies, then those technologies could be reused and recycled in other countries. And this would be a great contribution to ecological civilization worldwide.
I'm also impressed to see the eco-industrial parks (生态工业园)in China. Some 60 percent of Chinese production comes through industrial parks. They play a much larger role compared with Europe or Germany. Within industrial parks, the emergence of eco-industrial parks is important. What we have found in particular relevant is that there has been a systematic assessment of different eco-industrial parks and then the successful stories get upscaled. This is a mechanism for upscaling successful demonstration projects.
That is something where China is highly interesting for Europeans. Because quite often in Europe, we see the research running well at early-stage innovations. But then we have what is called the "valley of death," -- no financing comes into those innovations and supports market expansion. China is successfully blending finance sources.
Q: Energy efficiency is closely related to emission and the decarbonization of an economy. Germany and the European Union have an ambitious goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 while China sets the target at 2060. What and how can China and Germany, as well as EU, cooperate in this sector?
A: I definitely see the scope for not just learning, but real cooperation. For instance, the European side could understand how to recycle technology that is coming out of China, and vice versa. Also, there could be a joint innovation undertaking, such as cooperation on battery technologies, or the design of high-speed trains and their systems. There could be more mutual exchanges on how those things could work.
Setting common standards would be useful. Establishing a database where the data could be shared, so that European users might have an idea of how many rare earth elements are contained in renewable energy technologies.
The EU and China can also cooperate in academic sector, having joint PhD programs, for instance. In industrial sectors like renewable energy technologies, there could be ways of establishing joint expert groups and working groups that establish product standards, circularity standards, databases, and joint markets for re-use.
Q: What can China learn from Germany in improving energy efficiency and the circular economy?
A: Germany has been doing relatively well in incrementally increasing product standards, particularly in home insulation, for instance. So the window standard has become more and more advanced in Germany, and understanding the buildings as a whole system will also address the durability of buildings. Establishing durability in construction, materials and building systems are essential. So buildings could be reused and repurposed. That is something where Europe has made progress.
Given that around two thirds or at least 50 percent of China's greenhouse gas emissions appear to be related to infrastructure, the construction sector is really important. The next stage should be reusing construction materials and designing new homes to serve multiple purposes, while addressing indoor air pollution and climate neutrality.
Passive house standards have been established in Germany. Also, Germany has taken pride in bringing circular economy to private households. For many years, private households have become engaged in cleaning packaging materials so that they could be reused much more easily. How would a circular lifestyle look like? And how could those practices be disseminated? That is also something where I would very much hope that some German civil society representatives could pay a visit in China and then indeed study together with experts and citizens in China on how a more climate neutral and circular consumption style could be pursued.
Q: What do you think about China's efforts in developing green and low-carbon energy in recent years? What can China and the EU learn from each other in clean energy development?
A: One thing is the circularity of renewable energy technologies. That is something we would very much like to see more cooperation on. When we talk about climate change, we also need to look at agriculture and food. Agro-photovoltaic is a system that combines the advantages of producing green electricity while also giving shadow to the soil in times of drought. Combining agriculture and photovoltaics is one of the emerging things. There is an issue of food security in China as well as in Europe. It could make agriculture more energy independent as electricity is produced on the farms. That will not only lower water demand from agriculture but also help make the vehicles on the farms greener. The area of agro-photovoltaic would be super interesting to cooperate in.
I'll be seeing scope in housing sector. Buildings in the EU have come a long way and with improvement in insulation and becoming increasingly multi-functional. That is an area where China has a huge demand because of the megacities it has. China has also more medium-sized cities. Better concrete and cement are more carbon neutral.
China has been introducing carbon markets, so has the EU. Having a better alignment between those carbon markets, whether through emission trading or other mechanisms, is something beneficial. A state of competition could potentially be overcome in favor of more policy coordination in setting up carbon markets in both Europe and China. Coordinated incentive policies would be very beneficial for both sides.
Q: In your article, you have mentioned a popular phrase in China, the ecological civilization. It is part of the civilization concepts put forward by China to promote coordinated development of material, political,cultural and ideological, social and ecological progress. You wrote that it is like an invitation for Germany to think. What do you think about ecological civilization?
A: One of the things that we really need to learn from and what Europeans are impressed by when looking at China is its 5,000 years of civilization. Typically in Europe, we say that civilization has started around 2,000 years ago in ancient Greece and Rome. China has a very long tradition and a high level of civilization with literacy, with philosophy, etc.. Perhaps this also comes with a wisdom that short-term economic gains are not identical with the long-term civilization prosperity. And this balance has been broken over the last years with high levels of pollution, with the CO2 emissions, and with individual well-being hurt on occasions.
So establishing the idea of an ecological civilization also means to reflect on the priority, whether it should be economic growth, or whether it should be a broader understanding of prosperity. One that is more in line with the sustainable development goals, with societal prosperity, with mental health issues, too. Those conversations are ongoing among experts. Finding an alternative and going beyond GDP is important for both sides, definitely also in Europe. Establishing a system where ecological conservation is not just a long-term goal, but also becomes part of reforms year by year. Beyond the state, corporate social responsibility, efforts made by cities on how their citizens could flourish in designing public spaces within cities could be part of it.
For those who wants to learn more about China’s energy development, here is a useful link to a white paper on China's energy transition released last month.
White paper: China's Energy Transition
Is this unreasonably optimistic?
Does he really think Chinese emissions will go down soon when new coal plants are accelerating?
https://www.carbonbrief.org/china-responsible-for-95-of-new-coal-power-construction-in-2023-report-says/
Glad that China and Europe can cooperate on sustainability goals.