The 16th North East Asia Economic Forum, Toyama, Japan Oct.25-26th, 2007

The Situation and Trend of Energy-Savingand Emission Reduction in Some ofChina’s Inland Provinces

Dr. ZHANG Jianping
Director, Department of International Economic Cooperation,
Institute for International Economic Research, NDRC, China

Background The State Council has issued the decision to strengthenenergy saving and has formulated a series of policies topromote energy saving and emission reduction.
 The local governments also have made such arrangements

one after another. But energy saving and emission
reduction is still facing a grim situation.
 According to the survey in Heilongjiang, Jilin, Inner

Mongolia, Ningxia, Gansu, Xinjiang and Yunnan province
from the end of June to early July in 2007.

ContentsThe situations of energy saving andemission reduction in the surveyedprovinces
The main experiences and good practicesof energy saving and emission reduction ofsurveyed provinces
The problems and difficulties of energy
saving and emission reduction
The policy suggestions promoting energy
saving and emission reduction

Ⅰ The situations of energy saving and emission reduction in thesurveyed provincesTable 1 The situation of energy saving and emission reduction of each surveyed provinces in 2006
Provinces

The growthrate of GDPin 2006

energy consumption per unitof GDP in 2006

COD Emission in 2006

Sulfur dioxide emission in2006

Index (ton ofstandard
coal/tenthousandRMB)

Rise orFall(±%)

Index (tenthousand tons)

Rise or Fall(±%)

Index (tenthousand tons)

Rise or Fall(±%)

National
Level

11.1%

1.206

－1.33

1431

+1.20

2595

+1.80

Heilongjiang

12%

1.412

－3.04

49.75

－1.28

51.8

+1.98

Jilin

15%

1.591

－3.32

41.68

+ 2.46

40.9

+7.10

Inner
Mongolia

18%

2.413

－2.50

29.31

－1.32

144.6

－0.69

Ningxia

12.5%

4.099

－1.01

13.9

－2.80

38.07

+11Gansu

11.4%

2.199

－2.61

17.8

－2.20

54.6

－3.02

Xinjiang

11%

2.092

－1.06

27.27
(WithoutCorps)

+6.23

53.24
(WithoutCorps)+5.97

Yunnan

11.9%

1.708

－1.52

29.5

+3.50

55.1

+5.5

Source: The National Bureau of Statistics website and the materials supplied by each provinces and autonomous regions.

 Table 2 The goals of energy saving and emission reduction in eachsurveyed provinces’ eleventh five-year plan
The target of energy
consumption per unit of GDP in2010

The target of COD Emission in2010

Index (ton ofstandard
coal/tenthousandRMB)

Rise orFall(±%)

Index (tenthousand tons)

Rise or Fall(±%)

Index (tenthousand tons)

Rise or Fall(±%)

National
Level

0.98－20

1263.9－10.6

2246.7－11.9

Heilongjiang

1.17－20

45.2

－10.3

49.8

－2

Jilin

1.16

－30

36.5

－10.3

36.4

－4.7

Inner
Mongolia

1.86－25

27.7－6.7

140－3.8

Ningxia

3.31－20

12.2

－14.7

31.1

－9.3

Gansu

1.8

－20

16.8

－7.7

56.3

0Xinjiang

1.69

－20

25.67*

050.24*

0Yunnan

1.44

－17

27.1

－4.9

50.1

－4

Provinces

The target of Sulfur dioxideemission in 2010

Source: The National Bureau of Statistics website and the materials supplied by each provinces and autonomous regions.
Note: excluded Xinjiang Corps.

 The goals of energy saving and emission reduction (4%) set at thebeginning of 2006 was not realized in that year, which made theexecution of energy-saving and emission reduction target much harderin the following four years in the eleventh five-year plan.
 The level of economic development and the economic structure aredifferent in each surveyed provinces so that the effect of energy saving
is various.
 Each surveyed province sets definitely different goal of emission

reduction in their eleventh five-year plan. It is relatively easier forsome provinces to carry out their plans but for some provinces thatheavily depend on resources industry and heavy chemical industry,
such as Gansu and Ningxia, it is much harder.

Ⅱ The main experiences and good practices of energy
saving and emission reduction of each surveyed provinces ⅰ) Governmental leadership and management have beenstrengthened and systematic and institutional constructions havebeen improved further.
 ⒈ Established relevant organizations
 ⒉ Enacted and improved the relevant policies andregulations
 ⒊ Establishment of GDP energy consumption index
bulletin system ⒋ Conducted pilot audit on energy consumption

The first blast for energy saving in Gansu Province. No.1-No.3 cooling
towers of Yongchang fire power station were exploded after operated40 years.

 ⅱ) Adopted several other measures and aggressively

promoted energy saving and emission reduction
 ⒈ Enhanced the responsibility system and decompounded

the main missions
 ⒉ Accelerated the development of circular economy
 ⒊ Increasingly eliminated the laggard productivity
 ⒋ Implemented the priority energy-saving projects,
comprehensive utilization of resources and pollution control
projects
 ⒌ Increasing the input of energy saving and emission
reduction
 ⒍ Strengthened the management of the sources of projectapproval

Ⅲ The problems and difficulties of energy saving andemission reduction in the surveyed provinces ⅰ) Most of surveyed provinces reported that the energy-saving goals are a little bit difficult to accomplish During the survey, most surveyed provinces reported that theenergy-saving goals are a bit difficult to accomplish.
 Take the Jinlin Province for example (using its own eleventh
five-year plan ).
Table 3 Reduction of the energy consumption plans
Reduction of theenergy consumption
per unit of GDP (%)

Reduction of theenergy consumption
per 10, 000 yuan ofagricultural addedvalue (%)

total

average

totalaverage

total

averagetotal

average

30

6.9

18

3.9

35

8.3

15.5

3.3

Reduction of theenergy consumption
per 10, 000 yuan ofindustrial added value(%)

Reduction of theenergy consumption
per 10, 000 yuan oftertiary industrial
added value (%)

 ⅱ) It is difficult to adjust the industrial structure, which

fundamentally restrict the accomplishment of the task ofenergy saving and emission reduction
 The industrial structure adjustment is the essential factor of

the task of energy saving and emission reduction.
 Each surveyed province commonly report that it is very

difficult to adjust the industrial structure and the adjustment
can not be achieved in the short term.
 Xinjiang, Gansu, Inner Mongolia have a resource dependent

industrial structure, the major proportions of which are basic
raw materials and heavy industry.
 Difficult for them to develop the industries with advanced

technology and lower energy consumption.

 ⅲ) The prices of energy are a bit lower, which makeenergy saving and emission reduction much more difficult

 The surveyed provinces generally report that the current

lower energy prices can not reflect the situation of resource
scarcity, market demand and supply and the cost of
ecological damage and pollution control.
 The energy consumption entities lack the full enthusiasm

and driven forces of saving energy and comprehensively
utilizing the resources and usually pursue the economic
benefit only by resources and energy consumption.

 ⅳ) Inadequate economic policies and financial support

negatively effect on energy saving and emission reduction

 The surveyed provinces reports that to carry out energy

saving and emission reduction needs stronger policies andfinancial support from the government.
 But currently the relevant supporting policies are notstronger and carried out effectively.
 The policies to encourage comprehensive utilization ofresources, cleaner production, to compensate the loss forelimination of backward productivity.
 To make it worse, the financial support of government is notadequate, neither.

 ⅴ) The weakness of the relevant supportive conditions, such asenergy statistic, has a negative effect on the completion and theauthenticity of the work of energy saving and emission reduction

 Energy statistic is the basis of implementation of energy

saving and emission reduction and the condition to carry out
the system of energy consumption index bulletin.
 The survey shows that the energy statistics in most of

surveyed provinces is very weak and lacks of humanresources, material resources and financial power to carry out.

Ⅳ The policy suggestions promoting energy saving andemission reduction
 ⅰ) Accelerate the system construction to promote energy

saving and emission reduction
 Energy saving and emission reduction is not just a technicalproblem but also a system construction problem.
 From now on the work of energy saving and emission

reduction should be consistent and depend on the systemguarantee rather than be promoted by administrative power.
 The policies and regulations of environment and resources

should be kept perfecting and make sure be carried out
effectively.

 ⅱ) Accelerate the industrial structure adjustment and industrial

technology replacement

 The fundamental way of successful energy saving and emission

reduction implementation.
 Each region in its own industrialized process should focus not only

on the development of energy, raw materials and other heavy
chemical industries but also on the long-term development, forexample, accelerating the development the light industry,
processing manufacture industry, high-tech industry and serviceindustry.
 Stricter industrial access standards should be drew up in the fields

of energy consumption, resource utilization and environmental
protection. Compulsorily eliminate the heavy energy consuming
backward technology, techniques and equipment of specificindustries.

 ⅲ) More emphasis on taking economic measures to meetthe goal of energy saving and emission reduction
 Economic policies and measures are the most direct andefficient means to encourage enterprises and individuals tosave energy and reduce emission.
 For correcting the tendency to abuse resources and destroy

environment, taking the cost of exploiting resources and thebenefit of protecting environment into account, a series offiscal and tax policies helpful to saving resources andprotecting environment must be made to direct energy saving
and emission reduction by the implicit hand of market.

 ⅳ) Strengthen the efforts on energy saving and emission

reduction in important industries with a stricter control on
the sources of pollution
 Control on the pollution sources is the key part of energy

saving and emission reduction.
 Make sure that the new established projects and technicalreplacement projects on old enterprises meet with thestandards of energy saving and environment protection.
 Measures taken includes the strict implementation ofevaluation system of environment influence, aggregate
control system of pollution emission based on environment
capacity and environment access system, aiming to filter out
the high energy-consumed and pollution-emitted projects.

 ⅴ) Developing circular economy and forming a joint force

in energy saving and emission reduction
 Developing circular economy is an important way to reachthe target of energy saving and emission reduction, which isdefined as exploring new ways of using resources
comprehensively and cyclically and connecting economic
development with resource saving and environment
protecting.
 The target of circular economic development must beincluded in domestic economic and social development
planning, regional development planning and various
planning in the specific fields.

 ⅵ) Adjust measures according to local conditions to complete

the mission of energy saving and emission reduction
 Considering the large difference in the development

between areas across the country, the specific situation of
local provinces or cities, counties must be taken into
consideration in setting the targets of energy saving andemission reduction, by estimating the demand and potential
space for energy saving and emission reduction precisely.
 Potential large discrepancy between set goal and realized

level must be avoided.

 Meanwhile, a single pervasive standard is also unscientificbecause of the diversity of the technological levels anddevelopment stages in various firms in various industries.

 Thank you for your attention!