China: China and Denmark Share Best Practice on Green Policies and Solutions

During a speech addressing China's National People's Congress a few weeks ago, the Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang, stressed that China was increasing its focus on a more environmentally friendly use of energy, particularly emphasizing energy efficiency.

As part of the 12th five-year plan for National Economic and Social Development, China has intensified the implementation of energy efficiency, improved monitoring and evaluation of energy savings through capacity building and analytical efforts. A target of a 16 % reduction in energy intensity was set for 2015 and remains on track. The reduction from 2013 to 2014 was roughly 4.8 %, which was slightly below the target due to a minor slowdown in GDP growth.

Sharing Knowledge
In order to reach the targets for energy efficiency, China’s National Energy Efficiency Center is collaborating with the Danish Energy Agency in a knowledge sharing cooperation. The Danish Energy Agency regularly provides information on Danish regulation and policies; for instance, the Danish voluntary agreements on energy efficiency and the heat supply law. To exemplify the multiple benefits of energy efficiency the information about different policies are supported by a selected number of cases where Danish technologies, knowledge and methods have been employed. These case examples are provided by the public-private partnership, State of Green, which is Denmark’s national green platform with approximately 600 online profiles. These 600 companies, cities and universities contributes with nearly 1200 distinctive green solutions implemented all over the world, showing the many benefits ready to be harvested.

China has Ambitious Goals for Energy Efficiency
According to Qinxu Xie, Program Officer at China’s National Energy Conservation Center:

China is focusing on the first fuel energy efficiency and has set the ambitious aim of reducing its energy use by 67 billion tons standard coal in 2015 compare with 2010. The government has made ambitious activities to reach the aims. Denmark has more than four decades of experience in this field this is why we collaborate with the Danish Energy Agency to share best practice on policies, but we are also looking for Danish stakeholders’ good case examples and technologies to help us reach our aims and create new partnerships. We hope you will share your good examples with us through stateofgreen.com which will then be shared through China’s National Energy Conservation Center’s website

 1600 Local Centers Focusing on Energy Efficiency
China’s National Energy Conservation Center has 1600 local centers spread across China, working to support the local area to implement the policies focusing on conservation of energy. These centers and energy intensive companies are looking for inspiration on best practice on how to use energy in the most efficient way. The Danish Energy Agency gathers the information and shares it with China’s National Energy Conservation Center, who then shares it either by print or online with the local centers and other key stakeholders in China. The collaboration has just started and therefore the interest in preferably Chinese case examples of energy efficiency would be very interesting.

Energy Efficiency is Key in Denmark’s Green Transition
The long term goal for Danish energy policy is clear: The entire energy supply – electricity, heating, industry and transport – is to be covered by renewable energy by 2050. Improved energy efficiency is one of the corner stones for Denmark to reach its long termed goal, hence Denmark is also looking for new lessons learned. Therefore China’s National Energy Conservation Center will also share their best practice and cases with the Danish Energy Agency.

Impact
The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently reported that for the first time in 40 years global CO2 emissions from the energy sector halted in 2014, without being tied to an economic downturn. This was attributed, in part, to the change in energy consumption patterns by China.

About Danish Energy Agency's international cooperation, About State of Green (English), About State of Green (Chinese), About China National Energy Concervation Center, About the Danish-Chinese Cooperation

Helle Momsen FredslundFuldmægtigCenter for Global Rådgivning og ForhandlingTlf.: 25 72 82 91HMF@ens.dk