On June 24, 2021, China Carbon Neutral Economic Policy seminar was held in Beijing co-organized by Tsinghua SEM and Tsinghua IGD.
Group photo
The first round-table was themed with Opportunities and Challenges under China's Dual-Carbon Goal. Bai Chongen gave a presentation on the Potential of China's Economic Growth under the Vision of Carbon Neutrality. He analyzed the respective contributions of capital, labor rate and total factor productivity in China's economic growth from 1978 to 2019, pointing out that some industries were over-invested, causing some industries with high carbon intensity to grow too fast. Bai Chongen emphasized the need to formulate effective carbon neutral economic policies to change the distortion of investment, and to promote the quality and efficiency of industries so to achieve China's carbon neutrality goal.
Professor He Kebin from the School of Environment of Tsinghua University pointed out that an important transition of a carbon-neutral society is to develop from resource-dependent to technology-dependent. China's wind and solar resources are mostly concentrated in underdeveloped areas such as the Northwest. The transition to carbon neutrality will bring new growth opportunities to these regions. As carbon dioxide and atmospheric pollutants largely share the same root, advancing the process of carbon neutrality will help to completely solve the problem of air pollution in China. In addition, vigorously promote the circulation of economics, replacement with green technologies on the energy side, and reshaping of industrial processes are also important elements in the implementation of carbon neutrality goals.
Li Shantong, former director of the Development Strategy and Regional Economic Research Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council, pointed out that the national carbon peak does not mean that all regions reach the peak at the same time. She emphasized that planning should be carried out through the systematic concept proposed in the "14th Five-Year Plan" as different regions have different industrial divisions, and the paths to reaching the peak are different.
Qian Xiaojun, director of the Green Economy and Sustainable Development Research Center of Tsinghua University, pointed out that carbon responsibility will become an important part of corporate social responsibility. Educators cannot shirk the responsibility of cultivating entrepreneurs with a sense of corporate carbon responsibility.
Professor Wang Can from the School of Environment, Tsinghua University, proposed to support the realization of the "dual carbon" goal through technology from the perspective of energy consumption and energy supply. He said that the dual-carbon goal requires the deployment of carbon capture, negative carbon and other underpinning technologies now, changing the understanding of traditional costs, and changing expectations for risk structure, cost changes and technological progress.
The second roundtable themed on Research on China's Carbon Pricing Policy was chaired by Professor Cao Jing from Tsinghua SEM. Cao Jing gave a presentation on China’s Carbon Price Policy research discussing the operation of global and Chinese carbon markets and the impact of carbon pricing policies on China under different scenarios. She suggested that more research and discussions are needed on how China can design a broad carbon pricing policy while taking into account regional balanced development and common prosperity.
Zhang Xiliang, director of the Institute of Energy and Environmental Economics at Tsinghua University, said the development of China's carbon market has been faced with a trade-off between efficiency and political acceptability. During the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the carbon market is expected to expand to cover eight major industries, and financial derivatives in the carbon market should be developed cautiously. On the basis of a sound carbon market, other policies such as carbon tax can be further considered.
Professor Xu Jintao from National School of Development of Peking University and director of the Peking University Environmental and Energy Economics Research Center, shared the forest carbon sink from two aspects: extension and connotation. He emphasized that the forest stock volume per unit area in China is less than 2/3 of the world average level. Improving forest quality, restarting the reform of state-owned forest areas, and striving to increase the forest volume per unit area can bring 1 to 1.5 billion tons of new carbon sinks and further reduce the social cost of carbon neutrality.
Professor Zheng Xinye from the School of Applied Economics, Renmin University of China, discussed the time-space irrelevance and uncertainties of carbon science. It is necessary to discuss carbon emission reduction in the overall economic and social framework, and effectively identify and match the investment income and investment cost of carbon investment. Zheng emphasized that intergenerational emission reduction will equalize the cost and the effect of emission reduction between public funds and industries.
Ma Jun, director of the Public Environment Research Center, discussed carbon data, market mechanisms, and coordination of pollution reduction and carbon reduction, and focused on analyzing how social organizations can participate in the work of "double carbon" compliance. He proposed that it is necessary to develop and empower enterprises through digital platforms to help the real economy achieve green transformation and low-carbon development.
In the afternoon, professor Cao Jing opened the first symposium on the theme of "China's Carbon Neutrality Economic Policy Analysis". Zhu Lei from Beihang School of Economics and Management introduced the research results of the dynamic subsidy policy of renewable energy based on real options. Song Feng from the School of Applied Economics of Renmin University of China shared the empirical research on the reform process of China's electricity market. Li Zhi from Xiamen University discussed the carbon market quota - the selection of the allocation plan shows the experimental results of Lab-in-Field. Teng Fei from the Institute of Nuclear Energy of Tsinghua University has carried out a multi-model comparative evaluation study from the perspective of climate change losses. Mao Xianqiang from the School of Environment of Beijing Normal University and Wang Shaoda from the University of Chicago participated in the seminar as panelists.
Lu Xi from the School of Environment, Tsinghua University hosted the second academic symposium on the theme of "Interdisciplinary Modeling and Analysis of Low-Carbon Research in China". Luo Yong, head of the Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, shared the research and application of renewable energy meteorology. Qin Li, School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Peking University, introduced the impact of coal-based gas on air quality, human health and carbon emissions in China. Lu Xi introduced the research on the environmental and economic benefits of biomass and coal co-gasification negative carbon power generation technology.
Finally, Jiang Kejun from the Institute of Energy conducted a forward-looking discussion on the issue of high energy reliability and zero-carbon power supply in the context of carbon neutrality. He pointed out that the biggest problem of wind and solar resources is instability, which requires in-depth research on nuclear power, pumped storage power plants, The promise of energy storage and how these technologies can ensure a highly reliable power supply.
