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The fact that Rizhao is a small, ordinary Chinese city with per capita incomes even lower than in most other cities in the region makes the story even more remarkable. The achievement was the result of an unusual convergence of three key factors: a government policy that encourages solar energy use and financially supports research and development, local solar panel industries that seized the opportunity and improved their products, and the strong political will of the city’s leadership to adopt it.

As is the case in industrial countries that promote solar power, the Shandong provincial government provided subsidies. Instead of funding the end users, however, the government funded the research and development activities of the solar water heater industry.

Mayor Li Zhaoqian explained: "It is not realistic to subsidize end users as we don’t have sufficient financial capacity." Instead, the provincial government invested in the industry to achieve technological breakthroughs, which increased efficiency and lowered the unit cost.

The cost of a solar water heater was brought down to the same level as an electric one: about $190, which is about 4-5 percent of the annual income of an average household in town and about 8-10 percent of a rural household’s income. Also, the panels could be simply attached to the exterior of a building. Using a solar water heater for 15 years costs about 15,000 Yuan less than running a conventional electric heater, which equates to saving $120 per year.

A combination of regulations and public education spurred the broad adoption of solar heaters. The city mandates all new buildings to incorporate solar panels, and it oversees the construction process to ensure proper installation. To raise awareness, the city held open seminars and ran public advertising on television. Government buildings and the homes of city leaders were the first to have the panels installed. Some government bodies and businesses provided free installation for employees, although the users pay for repairs and replacement.

After 15 years of effort, it seems the merit of using a solar heater has become common sense in Rizhao, and "you don’t need to persuade people anymore to make the choice," according to Wang Shuguang, a government official.

Widespread use of solar energy reduced the use of coal and help improve the environmental quality of Rizhao, which has consistently been listed in the top 10 cities for air quality in China. In 2006, the State Environmental Protection Agency designated Rizhao as the Environmental Protection Model City.

Rizhao’s leaders believe that an enhanced environment will in turn help the city’s social, economic, and cultural development in the long run, and they see solar energy as a starting point to trigger this positive cycle. Some recent statistics show Rizhao is on track. The city is attracting a rapidly increasing amount of foreign direct investment, and according to city officials, environment is one of the key factors bringing these investors to Rizhao.

The travel industry in the city is also booming. In the last two years, the number of visitors increased by 48 and 30 percent respectively. Since 2002, the city has successfully hosted a series of domestic and international water sports events, including the International Sailing Federation’s Grade W 470 World Sailing Championship.

The favorable environmental profile of Rizhao is changing its cultural profile as well, by attracting high-profile universities and professors to the city. Peking University, the most prestigious one in China, is building a residential complex in Rizhao, for example. More than 300 professors have bought their second or retirement homes in the city, working and living in this new complex at least part of the year. Qufu Normal University and Shandong Institute of Athletics have also chosen Rizhao for new campuses.

Xuemei Bai is a Scientist in the Urban Systems Program for the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Organization in Australia. This article was adapted from an article that first appeared in the recently released report State of the World 2007: Our Urban Future, and was reprinted with permission from the Worldwatch Institute.

About 13,000 and 18,000 years ago, carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere in two giant belches that drove concentrations of the greenhouse gas from 180 to 265 parts per million, a level that held relatively steady until the industrial revolution. In a report published in the journal Science, researchers said they had found the answer in a sample of sediment drilled in the Pacific ocean.

• The researchers first correlated the bands of sediment in the core drilled off Baja California, Mexico, with the Greenland ice cores. Embedded in the 15-metre-long Baja core were shells left by micro-organisms;

•  The researchers analysed the shells to determine the ratio of two isotopes, carbon-12 and carbon-14. Carbon-14 is produced by cosmic rays in the atmosphere. Thus, so-called "old water" that stays deep in the oceans for thousands of years contains relatively little carbon-14 and lots of carbon-12;

•  The researchers found two periods stood out for their low carbon-14 levels. This meant water was barely circulating to the surface: carbon from decaying organic material was accumulating in the deep. However, the old water eventually rose to the surface, releasing its carbon dioxide in an enormous burp – and each of these gas releases was recorded in the Greenland ice cores. The burps injected 640 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere when the Earth was already emerging from an ice age. What started the warming is unknown, but scientists said the release of the gas accelerated it. Over a 10,000-year span, global temperatures rose by more than 14 degrees.

The Sydney Morning Herald, 12/5/2007, p. 15

You’re known for making business-savvy decisions. What’s your bottom-line argument for your climate program?

Whatever it costs will be minimal compared to our overall revenues, and we’ll get that back many times over, by running a more efficient company and by growing morale among our employees. This program is a huge morale builder.

What’s the business logic of weaving the climate issue into your content?

From what we see within our own company and from reading polls, the younger generation gets the issue of climate change completely. I think it will grow our appeal to younger audiences and bond our programming to them.

What opportunities does it present from an advertising perspective?

There will be a lot of national and international marketers who will want to take advantage of the public mood around climate change. Car manufacturers are going to want to compete on fuel economy, for instance. It may not be the main thrust of their marketing, but we are certainly hearing from advertisers that they want to reach audiences on this issue.

Can you give some examples of how you’ll infuse this issue into your programming?

Oh, the opportunities are endless. We own SPEED [a cable channel focused on cars and motor sports], for example — that’s got 60 or 70 million homes it goes into. We can get a lot of green programming in there. We’re going to encourage this effort among the writers on all of our entertainment programming, whether it’s sitcoms or movies or reality shows. Then there’s the online arena, where we have MySpace, where we’ve already launched a channel dedicated to climate change. MySpace has got 175 million profiles on it, and that represents huge reach among the grassroots.

Do you worry that it will seem awkward to wedge the climate issue into your programming?

No, we’ve got to make sure it doesn’t happen that way. There’s got to be a certain degree of gradualism — it has to feel natural, it has to make sense. Can a hero drive a hybrid car? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. But what about a biodiesel SUV?

In your speech, you said, "We want to inspire people to change their behavior." Would you characterize this climate campaign as "activist media"?

There certainly is an activism element to it.

Might that complicate expectations of journalistic objectivity?

We’re known for saying what we think in our newspapers. But this will in no way compromise journalistic independence. We’re not a monolithic organization. We have on all our media outlets lots of columns representing many different sides.

But do you see Fox News and your newspaper outlets covering the climate issue differently as a result of this program?

Well, certainly giving it more attention. There will be more articles, more references, but the same broad range of opinions.

You said in your speech, "The debate is shifting from whether climate change is really happening to how to solve it." Doesn’t that mean that the nature of the coverage would be changing, too?

Yes. I think when people see that 99 percent of scientists agree about the serious extent of global warming, it’s going to become a fact of life.

Some of the commentators on Fox News have expressed skeptical views about climate science — take Sean Hannity, for instance, or Bill O’Reilly. Have you heard any reaction from them to this program, or any backlash within News Corp.?

I haven’t discussed it with them yet. And, no, I haven’t heard any talk about it. Probably Sean’s first reaction will be that this is some liberal cause or something, you know? But he’s a very reasonable, very intelligent man. He’ll see, he’ll understand it. As will Bill — he just likes to get debate going between people. And that has its benefits — someone says "No there isn’t," someone says "Yes there is," and they have it out for 10 minutes and it’s entertaining and creates more consciousness.

You’ve been a longtime supporter of President Bush. What do you think of his climate strategy?

I’ve been a supporter and a critic of President Bush. I certainly supported his election. If you want my opinion, I think he’s a greenie at heart, but they keep having committees and talking about what they should do, in some cases instead of doing it. I think he’s a bad communicator; he should be getting out in front on this issue publicly.

Will you support, going forward, politicians who are trying to block action on climate change?

No. I think that that would be a litmus test, almost. If you had someone who is totally opposed to doing anything about climate change, I would oppose them.

Would you want them to support a mandatory cap on carbon emissions?

I would agree with that, to an extent. We have to be careful not to make this country totally noncompetitive, because it would just throw tens of millions of people out of work. Or worse, cause us to have to write a lot of tariffs, which would throw tens of millions of people out of work in other countries.

Do you have a favorite in the 2008 race?

I don’t know who’s sailing.

No, I mean the presidential race.

Ah! I thought you were talking about the America’s Cup! [Laughs.] No, frankly I have fairly skeptical feelings about all of the candidates at the moment.

What are you doing on a personal level to reduce your carbon footprint?

Well, I got a hybrid car, which is a Lexus. It’s a great car, but, I confess, I haven’t learned how to read the dashboard yet!

Howard govt tries to shift to climate-friendly stance while pretending it always thought this way: compromises credibility on current and future initiatives

The Howard Government has changed direction on climate change, while pretending that they haven’t changed direction on the issue compromising its credibility on current and future initiatives, argued Mathew Warren in The Australian (16/5/07, p. 6). Warren asked what would result from 400 future leaders of Australia in a room for two days, talking and thinking about the future? 
Climate change dominates summit: His answer was climate change. The issue wasn’t just prominent over the two days of the Australian Davos Connection’s Future Summit; it dominated proceedings for the cross-section of aspiring corporate, government, university and community leaders. Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer at second-day lunch speech which he used to proudly showcase the greatest hits of the Howard Government policy on climate change.

Downer challenged on true greenhouse cost of nuclear: Every time Downer mentioned the word nuclear, he was hissed. The first question he faced was whether he agreed with the proposal that politicians who told lies should he imprisoned. The second was a challenge on the true greenhouse cost of nuclear energy by anti-nuclear campaigner Helen Caldicott. Next he was asked how he could claim to be helping to save rainforests in Asia when he handed out a brochure on the Government’s climate change record. It was a tough room.

Now Downer thinks the mad scientists are right: Downer heckled questioners from the podium and appeared uneasy trying to explain to what extent he accepted the mainstream science of climate change, which had been so openly challenged by senior government ministers only a year ago.

Full story

Reference: “A Convenient Solution to an Undeniable Truth: We already have the solution”, UNSW Press, May 2007. Contact: Uthpala Gunethilake, ph: (02) 9664 0902, fax: (02) 9664 5420, email: uthpala.g@unsw.edu.au

Erisk Net, 5/2007

Related article by Dr Mark Diesendorf: Sustainable energy has a powerful future  

Climate change-driven conflict & natural disaster to displace 1bn people over next four decades: Christian Aid

The relief agency, Christian Aid, has warned at least one billion people may be forced to flee their homes over the next four decades because of conflicts and natural disasters that will worsen with global warming, reports The Canberra Times (15/05/2007, p.8)

Forced migration threat the most urgent: "We believe that forced migration is now the most urgent threat facing poor people in the developing world," said John Davison, main author of Human Tide: The Real Migration Crisis, the report published by Christian Aid. While the figure of displaced people was already staggeringly high, the report warned, "in future, climate change will push it even higher. "

250m displaced by global warming: The 52 page report estimates that over the years between now and 2050, a total of one billion people will be displaced from their homes. The figures included 645 million who would migrate because of development projects, and 250 million affected by phenomena linked to global warming such as floods, droughts and famine.

Photo: Refugees International/The Canberra Times, 15/5/2007, p.8/Source: Erisk Net