Chinas economy is growing at 10 percent per year and is predicated to be world largest economy within 20 years time. From the solar powered olympic stadiums to solar powered street lights to wind up mobile phone chargers its green all the way to clean up the dirty smoggy atmosphere of many Chinese cities.

As part of this growth there is an unprecedented demand for fossil fuels and energy and the Chinese have recognised that one of the best ways to provide for future generations is to use renewable energy at a time when oil and petrol prices are at record highs.

While the Western world offers incentives to the people and business to become green China passes laws to make it happen. I bought a solar lamp recently and that was made in China which doesnt surprise me as they are the worlds leading solar panel manufacturers. By being world leaders and investing billions in green energy they are creating hundreds of thousands of green jobs per year. The UK government talks of creating green jobs but doesnt back this up with funds and incentives. Only last week one of the few wind turbine manufacturers in the UK went into receivership. The Budget in 2011 is setting up a green bank to help investments in this area but I dont have much confidence in large scale change as billions is needed not millions.

As China is the leading exporter in the world then makes sense to become the leading exporter for green and solar energy equipment also. The low wages and excellent transport links mean that these renewable energy products can be produced at a lower cost than in Africa or Asia where they are traditionally sold. Favourable tariffs make it attractive to investors. I have sent a few solar lamps to a friend in Nepal to deal with the daily power shortages and I had to pay a tax of 100 per cent and I wont be sending more thats for sure.

China to home to over 100 mega cities with populations of over 2 million per City and without renewable power it will be impossible to satisfy the energy demands. The dangers of nuclear power are too clear after what has happened in Japan. The Middle East and many oil producing countries are unstable and hence solar is the way forward. There is talk of huge solar power farms being created in the hotter parts of China which feed into cities as smaller scale solar power can only have limited impact as they cant power anything bigger than a house and industry is what is needed and that needs power.

Only recently the Chinese are opening a second solar power plant in Tibet to ease power shortages. Anyone that has been to Nepal and Tibet will know that hydropower plays a large but failing part in electricity production as rising water consumption and falling rainfall destroys the potential of this.

Solar streets are being introduced in the largest cities where street lights and solar lighting and solar heating in buildings will be installed as the boom continues. I hope that this is successful and provides a model for other countries to follow.

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Category: World Affairs
Keywords: renewable,solar,china,green,consumption,cities,buildings,solar heating,lighting,nepal,tibet,hydro,