Can China start a clean industrial revolution?

China, the world's biggest carbon emitter, has now launched an ambitious goal: to lead the world into a new era - a clean industrial revolution.

With this in mind, China's 12th five-year plan (2011-2015) is focused on green growth, giving priority to environmental issues such as producing clean drinking water and reducing air, heavy metal and soil pollution.

The government has also set radical targets of slashing carbon dioxide emissions by 17 percent during the five-year period and reducing energy consumption per unit of GDP by 16 percent. The plan aims to increase the proportion of non-fossil fuels in overall primary energy use to 11.4 percent by 2015.

If China is successful in this ambitious goal, it will encourage new technologies which are more appropriate to a post-carbon era. Inevitably this will affect businesses around the world, so China's plans are of great interest and importance to us all.

There are several elements to China's green strategy:

_ Greener cities. China is determinedly urban, so a key element in the strategy is greener cities, with recycling of water and waste, self-sufficiency in water and energy use, energy-efficient buildings and efficient mass transit.

_ Energy efficiency. Apart from greener cities China has many broader policies to improve energy efficiency in industry and transport - for example, developing smart electricity grids to optimise energy use. providing seed money to companies designing and producing electric cars and subsidies to consumers who buy them, encouraging clean and renewable energies such as wind and solar (China is already the largest producer of wind and solar energy) and creating a network of high-speed trains linking major cities.

_ Research and development. By focusing on R&D, China is making continuous breakthroughs in many different areas of technology. One area of particular interest is cold nuclear fusion, as China believes that any country that discovers a new source of energy will hold the key to the 21st century. Chinese scientists are serious about developing a prototype thorium-fueled molten-salt nuclear reactor which would produce nuclear reactions at low, safe temperatures. The full weight of government support is behind them.

_ Resources. China supplies 97 percent of the world's rare earths, and is also the world's largest producer of lithium, elements which are crucial to the production of green technologies.

Developing green policies is clearly a smart strategy, at both the enterprise and country level. It brings important benefits for the environment and also lower costs of production, improved public health and greater energy security. As the second-largest economy in the world, with an impressive record of breakthrough innovation, China seems well placed to achieve its goal of ushering in a clean industrial revolution.

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