{"id":61611,"date":"2020-05-18T10:58:00","date_gmt":"2020-05-18T10:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinadialogue.net\/?p=61611"},"modified":"2020-05-28T11:06:34","modified_gmt":"2020-05-28T11:06:34","slug":"the-greening-of-chinas-industrial-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/business\/the-greening-of-chinas-industrial-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"The greening of China\u2019s industrial strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The prominence of China\u2019s role in the global green shift currently underwaymay seem a paradox. Whilst it has been despoiling its own environment and that of some other countries in pursuit of the same fossil-fuelled industrialisation strategy that made the West wealthy, China has also emerged as a renewables superpower, dwarfing other countries in its building of renewable capacity and the speed of its transition to innovations<\/a> such as electric cars<\/a>, trucks and buses. China is betting big on renewables and on a circular economy<\/a>. Indeed, the success of its development depends on this wager succeeding. Scale is the key to understanding its strategy: China\u2019s industrialisation is a process taking place at a scale without historical precedent<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like all previous industrial powers, China initially depended on fossil fuels<\/a> for its industrialisation. It has paid a terrible price for this \u2013 far more than earlier industrialisers, including its predecessors in East Asia. As China became the largest manufacturing power on the planet, it created a huge domestic market that provided a first port of entry to global industry for its manufacturing and service firms, on a scale that exceeded its East Asian predecessors. China was able to utilise its domestic banking system to channel flows of savings to firms as they sought to catch up with international rivals. In these ways, the strategy has followed earlier patterns of industrialisation, with emphasis on manufacturing, state guidance and state-derived finance, while exhibiting some differences in emphasis, such as the use of its own domestic market, its own finance and foreign reserves, and a combination of national and provincial state involvement and guidance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But a feature of China\u2019s industrialisation that is decidedly unique is its strategy for supplying the energy needed for its industrialisation efforts. Alongside China\u2019s \u201cblack\u201d industrialisation strategy, powered by fossil fuels, has been a \u201cgreen\u201d strategy, focused on renewables and circulated resources \u2013 again, at unprecedented scale. China has been greening its energy and resources system at a furious pace, while maintaining a dependence on fossil fuels that is steadily diminishing. The chart below reveals how China has been ramping up its green electric power system to become the largest green electricity producer on the planet. The shift in electric power generation towards water, wind and sun as sources is clear \u2013 a 15% green shift in capacity in just the past decade, an enormous change for such a huge technoeconomic system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n