The quest for clean energy: China’s green revolution

Meanwhile in the capital, Beijing, plans are well advanced to use renewable energy for a big chunk of the city’s power needs by the time it hosts what China is billing as the first “green” Olympics in 2008. Beijing intends to build a “solar street” where buildings and streetlights will run entirely on energy from the sun. To be green is to be hip in China these days, and even the government is taking note.

But is this the same China, infamous for its dirty rivers and poisoned skies? Nearly all of the world’s most polluted cities are in China, and other urban centres such as Los Angeles are suffering the effects of pollution from China’s factories. Green China as a concept seems ridiculous, particularly when you look at other headlines coming out of China. Strong economic growth led to a major increase in the discharge of major pollutants in the first half of this year.
The Independent