Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
However, the Chinese press have become more vigilant than previously in investigating
environmental failings and the Chinese public have become more confident in chal-
lenging political decisions they see as being damaging to the environment and to
public health. In 2011 an editorial by Environment Minister Zhou Shengxian stated
the 'depletion, deterioration, and exhaustion of resources and the worsening ecological
environment have become bottlenecks and grave impediments to the nation's economic
and social development' (quoted in Economy, 2013). In March 2012 former Prime
Minister Wen Jiabao acknowledged that the government had failed to meet many
of the environmental targets in the country's eleventh five-year plan, including
reductions in nitrogen and sulfur dioxide, action to combat water-pollution measures
and to reduce energy intensity.
There have also been human rights concerns over China's one-child policy, and
poverty eradication has often meant prioritizing economic growth at the expense of
the ecological environment. The one-child policy became national policy in 1979
and the fertility rate - that is, the average number of births per woman - has fallen
from 2.91 in 1978 to 1.6 in 2010. Apart from skewed sex ratios, China now has
an ageing population and social security finance issues. The controversies around
the construction, environmental destruction and population displacements of the
massive Three Gorges Dam have received global attention. Over 120 million people
live in rural poverty, and deforestation, resource degradation, overgrazing and the
over-exploitation of agricultural land remain serious and unresolved problems. Around
60 per cent of the oil China uses is imported and 40 per cent of the energy China
uses is to produce exports for Western markets. Much of this energy comes from
coal, which in China is cheap and abundant. New environmental laws and regulations
on clean production, renewable energy, environmental impact assessments and
pollution control have been passed to deal with the adverse environmental impact
of these market externalities and market failures, but enforcement has not yet matched
the strict intentions of the law makers (Zhang, 2002). Local officials are not always
very responsive to the advocacy efforts of local environmental campaigners. Air
pollution in some of China's massive new cities is a major policy concern. Thus in
2012 China published a major
National Report on Sustainable Development
(Peoples
Republic of China, 2012) and some Chinese economists, particularly Angang Hu
(Hu, 2006, 2011), have powerfully advocated a non-traditional modernization/people-
centred sustainable development, comprising green cities, green technologies, green
industries and green energy. 'It is possible for China not to repeat the high resource
consumption and high pollution discharge process adopted by many Western countries
and go straight to the stage of “green development” ' (Hu, 2006). China aims to
generate 15 per cent of its electricity from renewable resources by 2020 and over
30 per cent by 2050, and has set itself the goal of becoming a global leader in low
carbon technologies, including wind turbines, solar, hydro-power and batteries.
China is often presented in the West as being uninterested in combating climate
change, but its National Report on Sustainable Development strongly asserts the
opposite, stressing that it adheres to the principles of fairness and 'common but
differentiated responsibilities', as outlined in the UN Framework Convention on
Climate Change, and has made considerable progress in this area.
As of the end of 2010, China had ratified 3,241 clean development mechanism
projects, of which 1,718 projects successfully registered with the United Nations
