China is now the leading manufactuer of wind turbines. These industries have added 1.12 million jobs in 2008. It seems it will open up about 100, 000 jobs every year. Don't forget the low labor costs though, even if the people's incomes are rising. Yet, this race has only boosted up China's economy more than its dependency on other energy methods. China believes that by 2020, clean energy sources will make up about eight percent of its electricity generation capacity. Coal should be about 2/3 of the capacity by then with nuclear and hydopower filling in the rest. The government has spent 45 billion on this project alone in 2009. They have also set mandates for companies to use more renewable energy.
China's demand for energy which is rising 15 percent per year is allowing for its success. In the next decade, China will need about nine times more energy than the US. Intrest rates are as low as 2 percent for bank loans for many companies.
Wind energy costs 20 to 40 percent more than coal. Solar energy costs twice as much as coal. Thus the Chinese government has raised the energy bills from 0.25 to 0.4 percent for the general public. Sadly, sending power from windy areas over long distances is a problem.
"Every country, including the US and in Europe, wants a low cost of renewable energy," said Ma Lingjuan the director of the renewable energy project. "Now China has reached that level, but it gets criticized by the rest of the world"
This plan is great or seems to be. Its creating new jobs and reaching the goal for clean energy although rather slowly. Only eight perecnt by 2020 which is about a decade away but that is still making process. At this moment though, I don't think the US can compete with China at all in this field and will eventually be over taken by them. At least its having positive affects, aside from raising people's energy bills. There seems to be many problems with it but I guess they will all be solved in due time. I think the US should have done this while we still had the money to. (I know there were some efforts) Rather than wait until we are in a recession to get rid of wealthy taxcuts, why not prepare for the next time the stock market drops? Oh well, maybe I am simplifying the problem too much.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
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Come to think about it, this could just be one of out biggest global achievements of the century: http://www.pressdisplay.com/pressdisplay/showlink.aspx?bookmarkid=QJ8WE5H9VBS5&preview=article&linkid=69a1f320-c177-4ede-8631-cfbbc061e37f&pdaffid=ZVFwBG5jk4Kvl9OaBJc5%2bg%3d%3d
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I'm glad China is doing something to benefit its environment. China has a high demand for energy and needs to figure out better ways to get energy without harming the environment. By manufacturing more wind turbines it will help decrease the number of unemployed individuals in China by creating more jobs. Although there are many advantages to wind turbines, there's many disadvantages too. Here's a website I found that includes the advantages and disadvantages of wind turbines.
http://www.technologystudent.com/energy1/wind8.htm
Bravo to China for making such a big (and costly) effort. But its true, people are desperate for a quick, massive, and cheap fix for our energy problems and thats just not realistic. Wind turbines are great sources of energy, but the energy is difficult to store, and usually must be used continiuously. California has one of the largest populations of wind turbines, but whenever I drive north, there seem to only be a few turned on, even on a windy day-why?
I agree with Yvonne and everyone here. Since China is one of the main sources for producing world's goods, they should find better ways to get energy without harming the environment. And Sally, I completely agree with you. I never really see more than half of the wind turbines actually turned on or working on windy or rainy days. So it makes me wonder if they are truly effective or not. Or if they are just there for display to make us think otherwise.
Hmm. I'm not really sure how wind turbines work. I mean other than the wind blows and its like one of those small fans. Would it be smarter to store energy from river mills and just find a inexpensive way to do that? I mean there is plenty of water in streams now that the ice worldwide is melting.
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