Old Power Technology Not the Cause of China's Pollution
A detailed analysis of powerplants in China by MIT researchers debunks the widespread notion that outmoded energy technology or the utter absence of government regulation is to blame for that country’s notorious air-pollution problems. According to the study, Greener Plants, Grayer Skies? , the real issue involves complicated interactions between new market forces, new commercial pressures and new types of governmental regulation.
China’s power sector has been expanding at a rate roughly equivalent to three to four new coal-fired, 500 megawatt plants coming on line every week, says at MIT.
After detailed survey and field research involving dozens of managers at 85 power plants across 14 Chinese provinces, Edward S. Steinfeld, associate professor of political science and his co-authors, Richard Lester and Edward Cunningham, found that in fact most of the new plants have been built to very high technical standards, using some of the most modern technologies available. The problem has to do with the way that energy infrastructure is being operated and the types of coals being burned.
New market pressures encourage plant managers to buy the cheapest, lowest quality and most-polluting coal available, while at the same time idle expensive-to-operate smokestack scrubbers or other cleanup technologies.
The physical infrastructure is advanced, but the emissions performance ends up decidedly retrograde.
Steinfeld said the Chinese government lacks reliable data on how the nation’s powerplants are built and operated. Officially available data tend to be collected haphazardly and often by local authorities who have a vested interest in the outcomes. The MIT survey work represents a first-of-its-kind effort by outsiders to collect unbiased, objective data of this sort at a national level.
One of the most surprising findings was that “the kinds of technology currently being adopted in China are not cheap. They’re not buying junk, and in some cases the plants are employing state-of-the-art technology.”
The findings suggest that emissions levels from Chinese powerplants “depend almost entirely on the quality of the coal they use. When they’re hit by price spikes, they buy low-grade coal.” Lower-grade coal, which produces high levels of sulfur emissions, can be obtained locally, whereas the highest-grade anthracite comes mostly from China’s northwest and must travel long distances to the plants, adding greatly to its cost. Contrary to what many outsiders believe, the Chinese state has substantially improved its ability to implement and enforce rules on technology standards. It has been slower, however, to develop such abilities for monitoring the day-to-day operations of energy producers.
In some respects, the situation is more amenable to change than many people had assumed, according to Steinfeld.
With expanding regulatory capacity and increasingly sophisticated efforts to regulate through market-friendly pricing mechanisms, reformers could achieve change relatively quickly.
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Oct 07 12:50 PMMore by Research Recap