{"id":542305,"date":"2010-04-23T10:00:15","date_gmt":"2010-04-23T14:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.earthportal.org\/news\/?p=3300"},"modified":"2010-04-23T10:00:15","modified_gmt":"2010-04-23T14:00:15","slug":"the-2-biggest-carbon-emitters-find-common-ground-in-clean-energy-technology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/542305","title":{"rendered":"The 2 biggest carbon emitters find common ground in clean energy technology"},"content":{"rendered":"

Climatewire:<\/a> America’s relationship with China may be a swinging pendulum, but energy cooperation between the two greenhouse gas-spewing giants appears to be on a steady track, Energy Department officials and others familiar with the programs say.<\/p>\n

<\/a>From Google’s denunciation of China’s Internet censors to the White House decision to sell Taiwan $6.4 billion in new armaments, relations with China appeared to be on a collision course through early 2010. Recent weeks, though, have seen a spate of reconciliations. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner met with top economic officials in Beijing earlier this month, and the relationship warmed a bit further when President Obama welcomed Chinese President Hu Jintao to Washington for a nuclear security summit.<\/p>\n

Behind the scenes, energy and climate experts say, efforts to build Sino-U.S. cooperation on energy have progressed steadily.<\/p>\n

“The deterioration in bilateral relations between December and February is exaggerated, and I think the sudden recovery that’s being reported in the past few weeks is also exaggerated. There are mature adults on both sides of the Pacific,” said Trevor Houser, a former senior adviser to State Department Special Envoy on Climate Change Todd Stern.<\/p>\n

While flare-ups over specific issues like Obama’s meeting with the Dalai Lama can certainly put a “chill” over the relationship, Houser said, “I don’t think that’s had a material impact on clean energy cooperation.”<\/p>\n

In the run-up to the Copenhagen climate change conference last year, the United States and China forged a far-reaching package of energy measures, including a jointly funded $150 million clean-energy research center aimed at boosting cooperation between the countries. It also included initiatives between private companies and collaborations on everything from electric cars to shale gas.<\/p>\n

Late last month, Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced $37.5 million over the next five years for the research center, which will be located at existing facilities like universities and national laboratories in both countries. U.S. groups that receive the Energy Department grant funding will be expected to match it, and China will kick in the other $75 million.<\/p>\n

A basis for a broader partnership?<\/h3>\n

“By jointly developing new technologies and learning from China’s experiences, we can create new export opportunities for American companies and ensure that we remain on the cutting edge of innovation,” Chu said in a statement. “This partnership will also be a foundation for broader partnerships with China on cutting carbon pollution.”<\/p>\n

Some have questioned whether the United States should be competing with China instead of joining forces. In recent testimony to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, Assistant Secretary for Policy and International Affairs David Sandalow said the transition to clean energy is “not a zero-sum game.”<\/p>\n

The United States and China, he argued, can “leverage each other’s comparative advantages and bolster our energy security by becoming more energy efficient and developing new sources of energy,” adding, “Working together, we can do more than working alone.”<\/p>\n

Asked recently how the fluctuating relationship between the United States and China is affecting the energy cooperation, Sandalow declined to say. But in testimony before the commission, he indicated that the Obama administration is ramping up its efforts.<\/p>\n

The Department of Energy, he said, has created a new Office of East Asian Affairs and is hiring five new full-time staff to focus on implementing the cooperative agreements. Chu, he said, will travel to China at the end of May “to advance our overall objectives for clean energy cooperation.”<\/p>\n

Others, meanwhile, said the U.S.-China cooperation can be a key element in helping China meet the commitments it made at the U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen last year. China pledged to reduce carbon intensity up to 45 percent by 2020 — something it is already well on its way to achieving. But in Copenhagen it also agreed to record and submit the country’s mitigation actions — something that will require significant improvements in China’s domestic emissions reporting and its capacity to reduce greenhouse gases.<\/p>\n

Part of the agreement, for example, furthers cooperation between U.S. EPA and China’s National Development and Reform Commission on the detail-laden work of establishing an accurate inventory of its greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n

Read more>> <\/a><\/p>\n

Share This<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Climatewire: America’s relationship with China may be a swinging pendulum, but energy cooperation between the two greenhouse gas-spewing giants appears to be on a steady track, Energy Department officials and others familiar with the programs say. From Google’s denunciation of China’s Internet censors to the White House decision to sell Taiwan $6.4 billion in new […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-542305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542305\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}