2nd Joint Training Program on Low Carbon Development and New Energy Vehicles

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BTBU-ECOSF Joint Training Center with support of China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) organized the 2^nd joint Training Program on Low Carbon Development and New Energy Vehicles on July 6^th and 7^th, 2021. This training was hybrid event where participants in Beijing joined the workshop at onsite at BTBU campus, while rest of the participants joined virtually through Zoom. The training attracted participation of over 200 participants from about 20 countries, particularly from the ECO Member Countries. This training workshop was moderated by Dr. Di Yuna, head of the BTBU-ECOSF Joint Training Center and Engr. Khalil Raza Scientific Officer – ECOSF.

Prof. Dr. Zheng Wenhong, Vice President, Beijing Technological and Business University (BTBU) opened the training program. Prof. Wenhong in his message highlighted that Chinese government has incorporated the “Dual Carbon Target” into the outline of China’s 14th five-year Plan this year. China is actively acting in various fields, and has been actively working with other countries in the world to address the challenges of climate change. He further shared that China adheres to the principle of “joint consultation, co-building and sharing”, adheres to the concept of “openness, green and integrity”, and cooperates with relevant countries to promote the construction of a green Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

At the same time, countries around the world are also facing the crisis and challenges brought about by climate change, actively promote low-carbon development, and hope to learn from China’s development experience in related fields. Prof. Wenhong was confident that this program could promote exchanges and cooperation among countries, facilitate the building of a community with a shared future for mankind, and achieve global sustainable development.

Prof. Dr. Manzoor Hussain Soomro, President ECOSF in his welcome remarks emphasized that Science, Engineering, Technology and Innovation (SETI) play a critical role in providing policy instruments that are essential to develop strong base of countries in addressing the climate change impacts and boosting socio-economic growth and sustainable development. Prof. Soomro underscored that BRI of China commits to foster the industrial development with strong technical cooperation in many fields, including sustainable energy, infrastructure development, emerging technologies, and smart cities or transport etc. To achieve these massive goals, it requires a robust commitment to support science and engineering, including the capacity building and human resource development, Prof. Soomro remarked.

Prof. Soomro further elucidated that BRI offers a tremendous potential to spur a new era of trade, economic and industrial growth for countries in Asia and beyond. In order to maximize the benefits of BRI, the participating countries require to develop adequate technological workforce and engage in an alliance for promotion of cross-border cooperation in the Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) sectors.” Prof. Soomro highlighted.

The training workshop addressed three focused areas of low carbon development;

(a) Renewable and clean energy development
(b) Smart and resilient power transmission and distribution grid infrastructure and
(c) Latest electric mobility practices in the emerging markets, including China

Renowned experts and market leaders in low carbon development technologies participated as resource persons. The intended outcome of this training was to support policy development facilitating south-south cooperation, creating relevant knowledge and building capacities in the BRI countries.

Since climate change and its adverse effects are the serious threat to human civilization and one of the greatest global challenges of the 21^st century, therefore it needs to be addressed through international cooperation in the context of sustainable development. A number of countries have pledged to reach net-zero emissions by mid-century.

China has emerged as global climate leader with its announcement in 2020 that it would aim to achieve “carbon neutrality” before 2060. In so doing it joins the European Union, the UK and dozens of other countries in adopting mid-century climate targets, as called for by the Paris agreement.

China already leads the world in the clean technologies, and it is by far the largest investor, producer and consumer of renewable energy. One out of every three solar panels and wind turbines in the world are in China. It is also home to nearly half the world’s electric passenger vehicles, 98% of its electric buses and 99% of its electric two-wheelers.^[1] The country leads in the production of batteries to power electric vehicles and store renewable energy on power grids. By 2025, its battery facilities will be almost double the capacity of the rest of the world combined.

Hence, it was important to understand and share best practices and experiences amongst the countries towards promoting low carbon development initiatives. This training workshop provided an opportunity for transdisciplinary approach to facilitate knowledge exchange and dissemination to support policies and programmes through collaborative research and engagement. Hence, it is imperative for China to bring its extensive expertise and best practices in renewables and energy efficiency to Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries.

Experts underlined that promoting low-carbon development in BRI countries would require collaborative efforts from both within China—by leveraging finance and overseas investments in green projects—and participating countries—by promoting stronger clean energy and environmental policies that provide favorable market environments for China and other countries to make green investments in clean energy and sustainable transportation infrastructure.^[2]

Resource Persons for the Training on Low Carbon Development

Key takeaways of the workshop

Policy support is the key -

• The role of policy makers is central to the evolution of electric vehicles. China has taken a massive lead over the rest of the world in EV adoption, with strong backing from its New Electric Vehicle Policy.
• China's vigorous promotion of new energy vehicle is an important measure for the low-carbon development of the automotive industry.
• Policy makers around the world are trying to support the electric mobility with the primary objective of combating climate change. The policies are largely focused around financial support to make EV economics favorable for adoption by customers. 
• EVs are being encouraged with favourable policies like capital expenditure assistance, tax and permit exemptions, protection for domestic manufacturers.
• Lack of economic parity is a major hurdle in adoption of EVs today. Policy makers are trying to bridge this gap through subsidies to encourage EV adoption. Policy makers need to simultaneously adopt other levers also to encourage EV adoption further.
• China’s New Energy Vehicle policy has taken a number of positive steps and aggressively pushing and promoting EV adoption, and NEV policy is a significant leap among those.
• Mandated adoption targets, localization of key components, clear guidelines on regulations and standards and EV adoption in public transport are some of the key levers that policy makers in developing countries need to leverage.

China has established a robust manufacturing base for New Energy Vehicles

• China is both the largest manufacturer and buyer of electric vehicles in the world, accounting for more than half of all electric cars made and sold in the world in 2020.
• From 2011 to 2015, China began to promote new energy urban buses, hybrid cars and small electric vehicles.
• From 2016 to 2020, further popularization was carried out for new energy vehicles, multi-energy hybrid vehicles, plug-in electric cars, hydrogen fuel-cell cars, etc.
• In 2021, new industry players in cross-industry cooperation in car making have emerged one after another, and pure electric vehicles have gradually become the mainstream.
• Among the three core technologies of electric vehicles, namely battery, motor and electronic control, the most disputed difficulty which is also most difficult to break through lies on battery safety, battery cost and battery driving range.
• On supply side, China continues to improve and produce technology, provide high-quality green building materials, reduce material consumption from the source, and reduce carbon emissions.
• The rise of electric vehicles has caused upheaval in the Lithium ion battery industry. As of 2020, the global Li-ion battery manufacturing capacity was about 500 GWh per annum. A large part of this capacity is currently concentrated in China.
• China currently dominates the world in production of all four major components of Lithium ion Batteries (LIB): Cathode, Anode, Electrolyte, and Separators. After 2015, the market share of all four major components has continued to increase, and the supply share of Chinese LIB material in each component category has exceeded 60% in 2020.

Grid Expansion and Charging Infrastructure placement is critical to uptake of electric vehicles

• Charging infrastructure is the key enabler towards accelerated adoption of electric vehicles.
• The EV adoption and charging infrastructure is fundamentally a chicken and egg problem. On one hand, without good infrastructure, owning and operating an EV is not convenient for users, hence, they would want to wait till such infrastructure is available. On the other hand, low adoption of EVs drastically impacts the economic viability of any public charging infrastructure project.
• This requires robust policy support from the government to put up charging infrastructure. China has put up massive charging infrastructure that is denser than all major (EV adopted) countries.
• There is need for integrated development of grid, load and storage. Power load, transmission, and distribution network would have to planned synchronously to meet charging infrastructure needs.
• Currently, the driving range of electric vehicles has not reached the same level as that of gasoline and diesel vehicles, which is also the core problem hindering the rapid development of new energy vehicle industry. With shorter range of current battery technologies require more charging infrastructure to be put in place to reduce the range anxiety. In future, the large capacity batteries can eliminate the pain point of low driving range.

Conclusion: The "Chinese experience in new energy vehicles and low carbon development" can certainly help the energy and transport industry in the ECO Member Countries to develop towards integration, to strengthen the connectivity between upstream and downstream, and to drive the development of infrastructure development and related industries in the course of project implementation. The strategic proximity of ECO Member Countries with China and with emerging initiatives such as ongoing development of Special Economic Zones in Pakistan, Iran and Kazakhstan provide tremendous opportunities for the Member Countries and China to develop manufacturing base for electric vehicles.

Click here to view the complete report.

 ^[1] Fuqiang Yang, China Has Every Reason to Promote a Green and Low-Carbon BRI, NRDC (2018), https://www.nrdc.org/experts/fuqiang-yang/china-has-every-reason-promote-green-and-low-carbon-bri

[2] Barbara Finamore, What China's plan for net-zero emissions by 2060 means for the climate, the Guardian (2020) https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/05/china-plan-net-zero-emissions-2060-clean-technology