KAS/RECAP

The fourth Chinese-German Forum was attended by 28 intellectuals and scholars from China, Europe and U.S.A..

KAS Shanghai

Dr. Peter Hefele, Director of KAS RECAP, gave a presentation on the challenges of climate change and energy security China and Germany commonly face.

KAS Shanghai

Participants discussed concretely further cooperation between China and Germany.

Issues debated had been global economic governance, poverty alleviation, energy security and climate change. Dr. Peter Hefele, Director of the KAS Regional Project Energy Security and Climate Change in Asia and Pacific, presented his findings on challenges of the current Chinese energy policy and analyzed potential fields for closer cooperation between both countries.

Based on the findings of the presentations and discussions, four working groups collected ideas and elaborated suggestions for concrete cooperation between China and Europe: ambitions and accounting of transnational climate mitigation actions, low carbon innovations, improved science-policy interfaces, coupling of energy system transformations; the vivid discussions made clear that there are plenty of political, technical and social concepts and mechanisms in climate policy which can be optimized and improved. Only if China and Europe enhance cooperation in business, research, modeling, and policy making, a significant progress on the road towards a low-carbon society can be achieved. The following suggestions were articulated to point out and/or to build on key convergences between China and Europe in the context of the new bottom-up dynamic of post-Paris climate governance:

• China and the European Union can act as leaders of an „orchestration“ in subnational / transnational climate actions, linking national and local levels within the UNFCCC;
• Globally consistent approaches and methodologies of measuring and accounting for subnational mitigation efforts need to be developed;
• Establish a framework for R&D streamlining and long-term technological innovation on a global scale (multi-stake holder and / G20) based on an ambitious and strategic EU-Chinese cooperation;
• Create a data bank for all patent free low carbon technologies to facilitate their global transfer and employment;
• Energy system transitions in China and Europe need to be jointly envisioned as conceptually, technically, and commercially linked. The global dimensions of “Energiewende” offer many opportunities to develop collaborative modeling, planning, and implementing post-carbon developments and policies. Mid- and long-term complementarities and synergies need to be deliberately designed and deepened in order to fully realize potentials of, and accelerate the progress of, decarbonization;
• China and Europe should broaden and deepen law carbon cooperation much more energetically, e.g. including joint research projects, fostering e-mobility, joining decarbonization efforts in third countries, envisioning post-fossil urbanities, enabling long-term coordination of strategic R&D funding;
• China and Europe should improve the mutual understanding of different national scientific cultures and institutional differences of scientific advice as well as evidence-based policy making, risk perceptions, and centralized planning processes.