How the Chinese Government Deals with Environmental Concerns - Essay Example

How the Chinese Government deals with environmental concerns Students’ name Institutional affiliation How the Chinese Government deals with environmental concerns Rapid industrialization in China has brought a significant improvement in the economy with the country’s GDP reported to have grown on an average of 10 percent for each year for the past one decade (Shapiro 2013). Nevertheless, this has come at the expense of China’s environment and public health to an extent that the country’s environmental crisis has become the taking point. This paper seeks to highlight the environmental concerns that affect China as an industrialized nation and how the Chinese Government deals with the menace so as to avoid extreme effects of the same. China is regarded as the number one country in terms of carbon emissions with the quality of air for most of the Chinese cities failing to meet the standards of the International Health quality. Statistics indicate that the life expectancy for cities most affected by pollution is lower than for the other cities. For instance, in the north of the Huai River, life expectancy is lower than in the South basically because of air pollution. China engages in many economic activities that involve the production and the consumption of energy and this impacts negatively to the environment in terms of air pollution, water pollution and the most discussed environmental crisis which is the emission of CO2 that leads to global warming. As at 2015, the country’s energy consumption had ballooned with the country consuming 17 percent more coal contents than what had been reported the previous years (IPCC Climate Change 2007). These environmental concerns acts as a threat to the growth of the economy despite it being an already industrialized nation (Shapiro 2013). The Chines Government has come up with various strategies aimed at stemming further environmental degradation. At first, Chinese Government’s response to the environmental concerns that affected its economy were limited. However, as at 2008, the government had to step up its efforts on how to deal with environmental degradation (Shapiro 2013). This was as a result of increased pressures form the domestic and international communities which claimed that the nation’s environmental status as well as the people’s health were at stake. The Chinese Government has, in recent years, come up with various environmental initiatives aimed at reducing the effects of industrialization to the environment. The National Development and Reform Commission, China’s economic planning agency gave out its first nationwide blueprint pertaining climatic changes in China and also the plans and objectives pertaining the environment for the year 2020. Since 2014, the Chinese Government passed a regulation that more than fifteen thousand factories were to publicly report their figures as pertaining air emissions and water discharges. At the same time, the government stated that it had set aside $275 billion for cleaning up air for the next period of five years. Likewise, $333 billion was set aside so as to solve the issue of water pollution in the country. In November 2014, China and the US made a joint statement about climatic changes whereby China stated that it was committed to achieve its peak carbon emission by the year 2030. On the same note, President Xi Jinping announced, while in Washington, USA, that China would start a national cap-and-trade program in 2017 (Freeman & Xiaoqing 2008). The Chinese Government focuses on the creation of clean and renewable sources of energy such as the solar power, hydropower, natural gas, wind power, methane gas and biomass fuel. In addition, the government has come up with efforts aimed at reducing the consumption of coal through creating infrastructures that help in developing renewable sources of energy such as natural gas, increasing the number of power plants, adding more than 3000 megawatts of hydropower yearly, and promoting the use of renewable sources of energy for the generation of electricity. As at 2001, electricity generation through the use of renewable energy sources stood at 18.6 percent, with coal being the top. This meant that the environment was at stake due to the increased uses of coal as a source of energy (Yan 2015). The Chinese Government, in collaboration with the U.S and the United Nations embarked on multi-million dollar strategies aimed at promoting the use of renewable sources of energy so as to help in combating pollution. Since then, Chin has achieved a lot in terms of minimizing coal usage and promoting the use of renewable sources of energy especially the solar power. Wind resources are concentrated in the western, coastal and the Northern regions of China and are used for the production and transmission of electricity in the rural areas and the production of grid-connected electricity. Currently, China is regarded as one of the major investors in renewables with statistics showing that it invested $90 billion in 2014 for the purposes of cutting down the production of carbon contents into the air. Analysts have even predicted that China will overtake the U.S as the world’s leading producer and dealer in wind energy. The Chinese government embarks on giving Chinese firms incentives aimed at encouraging them to invest and partner with both local and international companies so as to come up with renewable energy technologies (Yan 2015). The environmental NGO community has been tasked with the responsibility of ensuring that it pushes the government to stay on track as far as the production and use of renewable sources of energy is concerned. Some of these groups include the Friends of Nature, Global Village and Green Home and work with the U.S and other foreign counterparts in promoting transparency, environmental grass root campaigns as well as investigating corruption within Governments (Freeman & Xiaoqing 2008). As indicated earlier in the paper, China is the largest remitter of greenhouse gases in the whole world and being a developing country, it plays a key role in the global efforts aimed at addressing the climatic changes and the environmental concerns. The 12th Five-Year Period (FYP) that ran between 2011 and 2015 was very critical as the Chinese Government had a new and different era in terms of climatic actions. During this period, the government shifted its climatic policies from setting broad goals to the creation of a climate policy framework comprising of various instruments for emissions reductions. The Chinese Government could now energy and climate policies as ways that grab economic benefits through job creation, reduced cases of pollution, energy security and health. The 12th FYP was expected to meet and even exceed the numerous energy and climatic changes that were set. As at 2011, the 12th FYP plan commenced and its target were to reduce the intensity of energy by 16 percent, increase forest coverage to 21.66 percent, minimize CO2 emissions by an average of 17 percent, and increase the use of non-fossil fuels by an average of 11.4 percent. At the end of the period most of these targets were met with other even exceeded and this indicates how the Chinese Government had been on the fore front in dealing with environmental concerns. All these achievements inspire the international community and increases their confidence that Chine will come to finally achieve its goals. Since the 1970s, the Chinese central government was aware of the environmental concerns that affected the nation and started making various attempts aimed at improving the environmental condition since then. For instance, in 1979, the Chinese central government passed the Environmental Protection Law which indicated that every citizen is supposed to care for the environment and that the government will always be on the fore front when it comes to solving environmental concerns (Soden & Steel 1999). In the Chinese constitution, the issue of protecting and caring the environment is well stipulated with Article 26 stating that the state protects and improves the environment in which people live in. in addition to this article in the constitution, other special laws have been enacted and passed. These laws include the 1984 Water Pollution Prevention and Control, Air pollution Prevention Control Law in 1987, Water and Soil Conservation Law in 1991, Energy Conservation Law of 1997 among others. The major concern has been on how to promote the culture of ‘clean production’ as well as the best ways of reducing air pollution. The Chinese Government has been focusing much on the Air Pollution Prevention Control which was first enacted in 1987 and revised later in 2002 so as be accommodative and comprehensive enough (Socolow & Lam 2007). The government has also established various regulations aimed at curbing the environmental damage that has been experienced in China since the industrial revolution. A good example is the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) established in 1998 whose role is to conduct research about the status if the environment and give technological advice on the same as well as the solutions for environmental degradation. In 2002, the Chinese Government came up with the Cleaner Production Promotion Law which has been focusing on ‘clean production’ especially in the major cities (Chow, Gregory 2007). Since China is an industrialization country and so a lot of energy is required in the factories for efficient production. To avoid the increased effects of some sources of energy such as coal, the government has been focusing much on energy conservation, clean and renewable sources of energy as well reduction of emissions to the environment so as to protect the environment. The government sets a separate kitty for environment conservation as this is a major issue that ought to be tackled. On the same matter, the Chinese government restricts excessive growth of the sectors that consume excessive amounts of energy and those that cause serious pollution. The government achieves this through tightening the use of land, setting strict market access, and also ensuring that there are strict environmental standards set for those wish to invest in energy consuming sectors such as steel, construction, metal and the chemicals industries. Moreover, the government restricts and imposes heavy taxes on exports in these energy consuming sectors though reducing export quotas, heavy export tariffs, and adjusting further export rebates (Yan 2015). The Chinese Government also focuses on reducing water pollution through monitoring what factories discharge as pollutants and imposing levies and fines to those who violate the already set rules concerning water pollution. Most coal burning factories emit large amounts of sulfur dioxide which can be a serious water pollutant is wrongly discharged. The government imposes heavy penalties for such emissions. In addition, the government has come up with special equipment that are able to capture these emissions. These equipment are costly for the government and to ensure that the equipment are used well by the respective factories, the government has set in place a monitoring device that measure the amount sulfur dioxide that comes out of each factory plant. Those who avoid the equipment or misuse them are penalized accordingly (McKay & Song 2012). The Chinese Government offers economic incentives so as to help solve the problem of externalities that come out as a result of energy use. For instance, these incentives are offered to the best factories in terms of safe energy use with those factories that still use high-sulfur coals paying extra tax to the government. This helps in encouraging factories to switch from the use of coal to the use of cleaner fuels. The Chinese government promotes the use of clean and renewable sources of energy through lowering prices for natural gas, water and other resources, raising taxes on pollutant discharges and installing a system that severely punish all those plants that violate any of the provided environmental protection laws (Chow, Gregory 2007). The paper has discussed various ways in which the Chinese government deals with the environmental concerns that come out as a result of the immense industrialization taking place in the country, having in mind that China is a developing nation. There are many reforms undertaken by the Chinese government as discussed in the paper. Various leaders and analysts believe that China responded very well to the environmental crisis and this triggers a lot of optimisms about the future. The current Chinese administration took a different outlook on climatic changes and came up with various strategies and enforcements that have dealt well with the crisis. 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