Advanced Silver Solution

There is much debate and concern these days about the damage of the huge and rapidly growing Chinese economy to the global environment.  Already they may be producing more CO2 than the USA.  Although the future Beijing Olympics has become very political due to human rights violation in Tibet, one good spin-off is that the Chinese are keen to enhance their environmental credentials to the rest of the World.

I read a few years back that some Chinese cities have Environmental Committees, which have the power to shut down local factories for a few days if the local air get too contaminated.  As much as I am not a fan of communism, this would appear to be an advantage of the communist system.  Imagine in the West if we shut down factories in any given city until the air cleared.  Large companies would be suing the government over loss of production and because their competitors in other parts of the country where getting an unfair advantage.

The Chinese actually have a 5 year plan in place to reduce the reduce their carbon footprint by 20% through mix of renewable sources such as solar and wind power.  With such a huge population in a rapidly modernising country, how can we expect the Chinese people to go without the things that we take for granted.  However, with all the haggling in the West over international environmental treaties and some countries not wanting to commit themselves unless other countries commit, it seems that it is the East that will set the example.  Whatever other aspects of China’s policies we may not like, a goal to reduce carbon output in a rapidly growing economy is to be applauded.