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Wind Turbine
Picture Courtesy of Goldwind This is a piece I originally wrote for a wider blog for outdoory types living in China. But I think it should be just at home here, because at the end of the day no-one can travel to China anymore and not pass concern for the air they breath, or infact the global effects of China’s emissions on the environment. If you’re reading this blog I’m flashing a guess that you’re an inhabitant of earth of human descent (blindingly obvious prophecy has always been a strong point of mine, though the smart-arse Martian at the back of the class can put his hand down now). I’m therefore extrapolating a wholly justified concern for China’s environment. Join the club. But I’ll let you into a secret. We’re not alone. There are 1.3billion people who are directly wheezing in gallons of the stuff everyday who share our interest more than most.
However on top of mere lung-fodder, I have a further personal interest. And a simple one; it pays my wage. I work for a Chinese wind turbine manufacturer. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t claim to be an expert, but what I lack in expertise I hope to make
Wind Turbine
Picture Courtesy of Goldwind up for with some good old downloaded statistics (I feel I’m treading a well-worn path here) and the strategic advantage of being the one doing the typing. So here is my penny’s worth on an industry whose potential to displace the need for dirty, coughing coal power plants will play a large part in determining whether decades from now we will be spluttering or handsomely gulping our way across the middle kingdom.
Incredible Growth What happens when you cross the world’s fastest growing economy, an industry with a global growth rate of 33%!,(MISSING) and some favourable government incentives? Well it all goes nuts, is what happens. Absolutely berserk. Bonkers. As crazy as a gibbon flinging custard pies, as the old adage might’ve gone. Welcome to China’s wind power industry. It is an industry that’s had an annual growth rate comfortably over 100%!i(MISSING)n the last few years (sorry, did someone mention some kind of global recession?), and is now the largest in the world.
In 2006 China had just over 2 gigawatts (GW) of wind power capacity, and thus set a reasonable target of 5GW of wind power by 2010 - enough to supply the needs of half
Wind Turbine
Picture Courtesy of Goldwind a million people. Well it achieved that target as early as 2007. Thus the target was changed to 10GW. This was achieved in 2008. The country now has 25GW - five times the original target, and enough to save around 70 million tonnes of CO2 every year.
Power Hungry There is a happy concoction of factors behind this incredible growth. To approach the easiest one first - China is simply gagging for power. Of any type. Everyone knows growing boys need to eat their greens, and China now gorges on three times the amount of power it did just ten years ago.
Secondly China appreciates the need to ease its current dependence on coal. The mining of coal in China’s northern provinces is a dangerous, dirty business. On average 13 miners a day are killed in China’s mines and according to a Time Magazine report, the soot-blackened city of Linfen in Shanxi’s coal mining heartland is the most polluted in the world. Additionally there is the problem of transporting the required tonnage of coal across China’s increasingly crowded rail and road network. The industry is unsustainable, and wind is an attractive alternative. China has plentiful wind resources (enough,
Wind Turbine
Picture Courtesy of Goldwind in theory at least, to supply the entirety of China’s needs), which is complimented nicely by the natural storage ability of ample hydropower resources.
On top of this it is a nicely independent energy source; wind isn’t liable to the frailties of international relations. While wind power is not the outright cheapest energy source, it is nonetheless price competitive and predictable. Having a free fuel source means that once a turbine is erected the cost of energy production for the next 25 years is essentially known, a nice property compared with the vagaries of global nuclear and fossil fuel prices. Lastly it is of course safe, clean and environmentally gregarious.
Driving for Change The hardest question is of course to dissect which of these is the real driver behind the government incentivising wind. There are many cynics who would doubt whether the last point has any more than fluttered past government minds, and it would take a far more scholarly mind than my own to answer this question fairly. But personally I can’t help but feel there are signs that China is increasingly concerned with such matters.
China has pledged to reduce carbon intensity by 40%!b(MISSING)y 2020 and in 2007 became the first developing country to publish a national strategy addressing global warming, with its
“National Action Plan on Climate Change”. Ok, so it refused to agree to a binding international agreement at Copenhagen, but did anyone truly expect it to drop its resolutely independent stance to binding international agreements as quickly as that? (The fact that the rest of the world were happy to let the deal fail, and then squarely lay the blame on a country that lies 96th on a list of biggest emitters per capita is a story for another day).
What is unarguable is that China stands to lose a lot from global warming and environmental degradation, and there are definite signs it’s beginning to realise. Within the wind industry this is transformed into incentives such as tax breaks, cheap loans for manufacturers and an obligation for the power companies to purchase all the wind energy produced.
Another interesting consideration is that in a recent survey 88%!o(MISSING)f Chinese said they were concerned about global warming - a figure that’s considerably higher than in most developed countries and hard for any government to ignore, democratic or otherwise.
A World of Difference There are also wider ramifications of China’s booming wind industry. From virtual obscurity a few years ago three Chinese manufacturers are now among the ten biggest in the world, and they are beginning to take their machines abroad. China’s biggest manufacturer, Sinovel, claims its turbines are 1/3 cheaper than western counter parts. They may not be leading the way in design sophistication but manufacturing is China’s favourite subject at school, and it is increasingly flexing its muscles on the international wind scene. Prices will be driven lower, further boosting the worldwide adoption of a technology that is at the forefront of dealing with the increasingly hot and sticky problem of climate change.
Of course China’s problems are far from solved. There are major hurdles still to overcome. Transmission networks need to be improved, as does the reliability of the turbines. The soaring energy demand needs to be brought under control - while the country is building a lot of renewable power it’s also still building 2 coal power stations a week. But there are definite signs that a bit of delicately-placed optimism is more than justified. It’ll take time, but there is hope for the future of China’s environment. And you know what, I even saw my first Chinese rainbow today... Miracles can happen.
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