Prof. Dr. Wolfram Elsner

Author: Prof. Dr. Wolfram Elsner

Commentary

The Ecological Superpower: The Contribution of Chinese Environmental Policy to the World

A Reflection Following the Third Plenum of the 20th Central Committee, July 2024

The 3rd Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee developed an integrated concept for the comprehensive modernization of China across all aspects of the economy and society. A core dimension of this modernization is the natural environment. China’s environmental policy has long been pursued under the objective of establishing an all-encompassing Chinese ecological civilization. It is rooted in the fundamental recognition that humanity exists as a shared global community, where only a united future for humankind is viable. In the face of critical ecological and other global crises, humanity faces the risk of an escalating poly-crisis that brings global collapse ever closer. Within this framework, China has also introduced global initiatives addressing development, civilization, security, and major peace efforts, alongside numerous individual diplomatic initiatives. In contrast, the Western political bloc has lost any recognizable progressive global vision or initiative. The West is preoccupied with its unmistakable global decline, the loss of its former dynamism and hegemony, and numerous internal and external crises. It now plays only a minimal role in addressing global human issues, while assuming an outsized role in restrictive, negative, aggressive, and militaristic actions. The West’s dominant objective is no longer its own renewal and reform or a bid for the support of people worldwide, but rather the containment of its growing list of self-declared adversaries, foremost among them, China.

China’s Rise as an Ecological Superpower: Achievements, Systemic Innovations, and Global Influence

Within just a few decades, China has risen to become the largest ecological superpower. Here, goals, motivation, and systemic capacity for action go hand in hand. For example, awareness of a shared future for all life on Earth permeates daily life in Chinese society. A green lifestyle for all citizens is not only a government "roadmap" but also ingrained in everyday behavior.

Chinese consumers are globally leading in eco-consciousness and behavior: for example, sustainable packaging holds the highest importance in China compared to other countries, and the willingness to pay for it is the highest globally (mckinsey.com, March 1, 2022). In terms of readiness to switch from conventional cars to "mini-mobility" options such as one- or two-seater mini EVs (3- or 4-wheeled), Chinese consumers are also leading (57% of Chinese respondents find this likely, compared to a global 31% and only 15% in Germany) (mckinsey.com, December 13, 2022). Hundreds of millions contribute to reforestation through daily ecological behavior using the Ant Forest app, which facilitates mass tree-planting efforts. According to the UN, China has also led in recent years in preserving and enhancing biodiversity, particularly during recent UN biodiversity conferences (COP 15 in Kunming, 2021; Montreal, 2022), which China chaired. The biodiversity strategy is integrated into the world's most ambitious reforestation program, covering enormous forested areas, 12,000 national parks, specialized nature reserves, and biodiversity zones. These efforts require highly qualified, multidisciplinary, long-term measures that combat desertification, create new water cycles, improve regional climates, provide new agricultural options for previously impoverished farmers, and open up new tourism opportunities. Notably, this unique strategy mathematically enables China to offset a majority of its national carbon emissions. No other country can demonstrate such an active carbon reduction approach. Numerous international research institutions are participating in China’s reforestation programs to learn from these efforts. Tree belts and protected green areas are found everywhere, from green multi-million-population Chinese cities to the highways and main roads. Air quality in Beijing and other major cities in the east has reached excellent levels within two to three decades.

The world is informed daily through international news outlets (though rarely by Western opinion media) about the dynamism with which China is meeting its CO2 targets under the Paris UNEP Agreement. Some climate targets for 2030 and 2035 have already been met by China as early as 2023: for instance, China has already surpassed its CO2 emissions peak, initially projected for 2030. Daily updates and analyses from the Global Energy Monitor, International Energy Agency (IEA), and others show how quickly coal, oil, and gas are being replaced in China as direct energy sources and for power generation by renewable energy expansion. China achieved the solar and wind energy production targets originally set for 2030 by 2024. In solar panels, wind turbines, new drives (EVs, hydrogen, induction on solar-panel highways, etc.), new storage technologies (batteries), and intelligent driving systems, China now produces more than all Western industrial countries combined. In China, eco-energies are now cheaper than fossil fuels, demonstrating how markets can be organized to support sustainable practices. Technological progress in China is advancing in such a way that ecologically relevant productivity increases allow for the same amount of production to be achieved with ever fewer resources and ever-lower CO2 emissions (eco-efficiency). In the 13th Five-Year Plan (FYP), annual GDP growth of 5.7% was achieved with only 2.8% energy growth. The figures for the 14th Five-Year Plan (2020-25): energy consumption per GDP unit decreased by 13.5%, CO2 emissions per GDP unit fell by 18%, and CO2 efficiency per energy unit increased by one-third. By comparison, per capita energy consumption in the U.S. is more than twice that of China, with an increasing trend (OurWorldinData.org).

The Green Silk Roads Initiative: Pathways to Sustainable Industrialization and Climate Partnership with the Global South

The collective West dismisses China’s ecological transformation, the closure of coal mines, coal-fired power plants, and other outdated industrial capacities, and the development of eco-technologies and products, as “overcapacity flooding world markets.” The truth is that China’s technological progress, combined with effective competition, the establishment of a large, affluent, and growing domestic market, and much lower capital and profit costs, enables eco-technologies and eco-products to be offered at low, affordable prices. While China develops the vast majority of eco-technologies and products globally, it does so primarily not as an "export world champion." Most production is for China’s own development and domestic economy, with a declining proportion exported to the Western bloc.

At the same time, China has enabled sustainable industrialization in the Global South for the first time. This has been achieved through climate funds, the Kunming Biodiversity Fund, the Shanghai debt-relief-for-environment investment model, and numerous other financial support measures under the UN. The Green Silk Roads, integrating all these individual measures, now represent the world’s largest contiguous eco-project and the primary driver of the global climate transition. Yet, even China's major eco-investments in the Global South are insufficient to fully achieve a global climate transition. The IEA estimates that the global pace of renewable energy expansion must triple, EV sales must increase by 4.5 times from 2022 levels, and the deployment of photovoltaic modules must increase tenfold to meet global 2030 climate targets. Although China is now the "green and sustainable factory of the world" (Roland Berger, Global Times, March 7, 2024), the global climate transition will likely remain out of reach given the Western bloc’s failure to participate in these efforts. China has become the world's ecological engine and the No.1 ecological superpower. More and more countries are joining these efforts, fostering an increasing global consciousness of a shared world and creating synergies. Let us work to ensure that the quest for human survival prevails over hatred, war, and chaotic policies.