Home > Authors > Sarah O. Ladislaw > China--leader or laggard on the path to a secure, low-carbon energy future?
China--leader or laggard on the path to a secure, low-carbon energy future?
"There has been a great deal of talk about whether and how China will manage its need to provide enough energy to ensure continued economic growth while avoiding the local and global environmental impacts of its energy production and use. To listen to the political discourse, China is either a global leader on clean energy technologies and transformation or the largest source of emissions with serious, systemic local environmental degradation. How can it at once be a low-carbon leader and a laggard? China's ability to be both lies in the pace of its current energy transformation, its size, and its willingness to put in place tough policies to try and alter its current energy trajectory. With the current energy mix, China's rapid growth and the associated environmental implications will undoubtedly wreak havoc on the global climate and local environmental conditions. Chinese...
