Sunday, September 21, 2008

China to become greener with the new law?

China is one of the world's largest emitters of CO2, greenhouse gas mainly responsible for global warming. Such high level of CO2 emission is mostly the result of coal based economy that helped China achieve incredible economic boom in the last couple of years. On the one hand China's economy recorded instant success, while on the other China pays extremely high environmental price for such rapid growth.

This is the main reason why China's legislature approved a new law designed to put production in on a more sustainable foundation and go green by raising efficiency and harnessing alternative energy sources to reduce reliance on coal, and other fossil fuels responsible for global warming.

Despite this positive law many environmentalists are still worried because having the law doesn't necessary mean obeying the law, especially since many industries believe how this law
could undermine its competitive advantage on global market, and stop China's economic boom. Another problem that could affect efficiency of this law are provincial and local governments across the China that compete to attract and retain fossil fuels based industries, and the last thing they want is a law like this.

The problem lies in the fact that many countries, including China haven't still figured it out that they have to achieve competitive advantage with clean energy, and not by sticking with fossil fuels. We know now that fossil fuels are bad solution that can only make global warming more serious than it already is. And as soon as China, and other big CO2 emitters (USA, Australia, etc..) realize this, the better it will be, not only for them, but for people worldwide. Why not compete in clean energy sector and who'll become greener? Industry should focus more on developing newer cleaner technologies, instead of protesting and complaining about losing competitive edge. After all every successful industry should follow modern trends, and newer, better solutions. Does everything always have to be around money?

No comments:

Post a Comment