US laboratory to promote green buildings in China

(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-12-04 10:06

WASHINGTON -- The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory will help China develop more energy-efficient buildings under a new program sponsored by the US State Department.

The program, announced Wednesday, calls for PNNL researchers to oversee a pilot program in two Chinese cities, to help officials develop stricter building codes that promote energy efficiency.

The US State Department awarded PNNL a $518,000 grant for the program, awarded under a seven-nation program called the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate. Besides the United States and China, members are Australia, Canada, India, Japan and South Korea. PNNL, located in the state of Washington, is a division of the US Energy Department.

Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Democrat who represents the state, called the program timely.

The program, formalized Wednesday with a memorandum of understanding signed in the State Department's ornate Treaty Room, marks the first time State has designated a national lab to help China gain compliance with stricter energy efficiency standards.

"This moves China and the US away from a global scrabble for oil to a global greener future," Cantwell said.

China, which has the world's second-highest building energy use behind the United States, has announced an ambitious goal to make new buildings 50 percent more energy efficient by 2010. Because buildings can last up to 50 years or more, designs implemented today can affect emissions for many years, said Meredydd Evans, a PNNL senior energy expert.

PNN and its partners will train Chinese building inspectors, designers, construction companies and others to develop strict building standards and test market-based incentive programs to support code enforcement, Evans said.

The two Chinese cities have not been selected, but officials expect one to be in the country's northern section and another in central China.