Powering up new energy partnership
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The development of the new energy industry has moved high up the agenda of many countries in the face of the common threats of global climate change and energy insecurity.
For China, with its accelerating process of industrialization and urbanization, continued development is challenged by its scarcity of resources, energy shortages and the rising costs of energy, etc. The development of the new energy industry would help ease the energy shortage and facilitate China's shift toward low-carbon economic growth.
For the US, the new energy industry has the potential to support its economic growth and sustain its influence on the global community. The Obama administration has also been trying to push new energy as the opportunity for the US to reassert its leadership in technology and innovation.
Obviously, the new energy sector concerns the common interests of the two countries. The great market potential of China and the leading technology of the US make the two countries complementary, laying a solid foundation for bilateral cooperation.
Indeed, bilateral cooperation between the two in this field is inevitable. After decades of research and experiment, the US leads the world in new energy technology, and it has widely put its technology and energy-saving management mode into practice. However, as a mature economy, the US has stable energy supply and demand and thus cannot apportion a large share to new energy in the short run. Therefore, in order to continue new energy technology research and development, the US has to turn its attention to the overseas market.
China's demand for energy is still increasing and it is making big efforts to direct its development mode onto a sustainable path through the promotion of new energy.
In fact, China is not a barren wilderness for new energy sources, it is abundant in solar and wind energy. China will be a bountiful pasture for new energy as long as it can break the technology bottleneck. China's present low-end energy consumption means not only great potential for energy saving and emissions reduction, but also a huge market for technological experiment.
Viewed in this light, it is mutually beneficial for China and the US to work together in the new energy sector, especially on new technology. The second China-US Strategic and Economic Dialogue in May, 2010 secured 26 agreements, almost half of which were on clean energy. This shows that the two economies share many common interests and can reach consensus.
As the two largest economies with huge energy consumption and carbon emissions, close partnership between China and the US would send a positive message to the global community.
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