Energy Challenges, Problems and Strategies in China - Implementing Environmental and Resource Management - page 105

11 Energy Challenges, Problems and Strategies
in China
Shouke Wei
Department of Ecosystem and Environmental Informatics, Brandenburg Univer-
sity of Technology, Cottbus, Germany
11.1 Introduction
Energy is vital to the survival and development of human beings. The increasing
demand for energy and the related environmental problems have become an ex-
tremely important issue. China takes the first place in energy production and the
second in consumption in the world. It is playing and will continue to play an im-
portant international role in energy production and consumption, energy configu-
ration, as well as related environmental and ecological challenges. This study aims
to investigate China's energy situation, and the related challenges and problems
through an analysis based on environment and fundamental resource-economy sta-
tistics. To address China's energy challenges and problems, five important strate-
gies were proposed. The results of this study are expected to help energy scholars,
planners, strategists and organizations to further investigate China's energy prob-
lems and to make energy policy decisions.
Energy is one of the essential factors constraining the socio-economic devel-
opment and life-style of a nation. Humans have experienced many energy evolu-
tions, from firewood to coal, and to petroleum oil, nuclear, and biofuels (Jiang
2008). Every energy evolution caused a great leap in productivity, which greatly
promoted the socio-economic development (Jiang 2008). However, in the past
decades, increasing energy consumption and its related environmental problems
have gained greater attention, the world over. According to a BP Statistical Re-
view of World Energy (BP 2008), in 2007 world primary energy consumption in-
creased by 2.4%, global oil consumption by 1.1%, gas consumption by 3.1%, and
coal consumption by 4.5% ( Fig. 11.1a ). Limited energy can also bring about
socio-economic instability. In 1970s, the two world oil crises resulted in the eco-
nomic deceleration of some developed countries, and the fluctuation of the world
economy. Similarly, in this century, the continuous oil price increase has caused
social instability in some countries. Figure 11.1b demonstrates the changes of
crude oil prices in both nominal US$ prices and 2007 US$ price from 1861 to
2007. From this figure, the two price peaks and constant price are clearly visible,
as well as the projected increasing trend in the few years to follow.