Editorials

Strive for energy goal

(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-04 07:46

A disturbing report that China's energy consumption per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) dropped by only 2.2 percent last year has so far slipped below the radar of most domestic press.

With the National People's Congress, the country's top legislature, starting its annual session tomorrow in Beijing, we have ample reasons to expect that lawmakers will stand firm on the country's goal of cutting energy intensity by 20 percent between 2006 and 2010.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, China's energy consumption per unit of GDP was down 1.79 percent year in 2006, 4.04 percent in 2007 and 4.59 percent in 2008.

Clearly, a 2.2-percent drop of energy intensity in 2009 is really not something to celebrate if the country is to meet the five-year energy goal. Our crude calculations show China may have to sustain its GDP growth - which could maintain last year's pace - without any increase in energy use this year.

That is certainly a tough task, but a worthwhile one.

It will take a while for Chinese policymakers to figure out why the country's energy consumption has rebounded much more drastically than the overall economic expansion.

A sharper decline of energy consumption compared with GDP growth early last year was once deemed evidence of an improved industrial structure. But the result paints a different picture: The economy is less energy efficient than expected.

The worst global recession in many decades has made it more difficult to achieve the five-year energy efficiency goal. But our lawmakers still can, and should, urge the government to do their best in fulfilling it.

(China Daily 03/04/2010 page8)