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Chang, Pei-fei; Belis, David; Bruyninckx, Hans --- "EU–China Climate Relations: The Clean Development Mechanism and Renewable Energy in China" [2012] ELECD 921; in Wouters, Jan; de Wilde, Tanguy; Defraigne, Pierre; Defraigne, Jean-Christophe (eds), "China, the European Union and Global Governance" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: China, the European Union and Global Governance

Editor(s): Wouters, Jan; de Wilde, Tanguy; Defraigne, Pierre; Defraigne, Jean-Christophe

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781781004265

Section: Chapter 14

Section Title: EU–China Climate Relations: The Clean Development Mechanism and Renewable Energy in China

Author(s): Chang, Pei-fei; Belis, David; Bruyninckx, Hans

Number of pages: 18

Extract:

14. EU­China climate relations: the
Clean Development Mechanism
and renewable energy in China
Pei-fei Chang, David Belis and Hans Bruyninckx

INTRODUCTION

This chapter studies the use, role and validity of the Clean Development
Mechanism (CDM) in European Union relations with China on climate
change, with a particular focus on the renewable energy (RE) sector. The
relationship between the EU and China on climate mitigation is a
significant one, since both are key players in global climate governance.
The European Union is by far the largest economic bloc engaged in the
Kyoto Protocol in the developed world (Jordan et al., 2010) and it is
responsible for one of the largest shares of historical emissions worldwide,
while China is the largest political and economic power among developing
countries and the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions at present and
for the foreseeable future (Netherlands Environmental Assessment
Agency, 2007). The CDM plays a controversial role in this relationship,
providing finance for renewable energy technology development in China
on the one hand (EU­China CDM Facilitation Project, 2009), while
posing various problems linked to environmental integrity, transparency
and EU­China competition in the RE sector on the other (Delbeke, 2011;
Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, 2011;
interviews, Beijing).
This chapter aims to uncover a number of basic insights into the rather
technical and at times opaque nature of the CDM as part of EU­China
climate relations. A comprehensive account of the problems related to
EU­China CDM cooperation, however, ...