China's Environmental Challenges and Policy Responses

Key Insight

China's rapid industrialization has led to extreme environmental degradation, prominently featured by severe air, water, and soil pollution. A notable event was the 'Airpocalypse' in Beijing in January 2013, where particulate concentrations reached nearly 800 micrograms per cubic meter, exceeding the World Health Organization's safe limit by more than thirty times. Globally, China became the largest emitter of greenhouse gases in 2007, and by 2012, it accounted for 24 percent of global emissions—more than the United States and European Union combined. Roughly 85 percent of China's total emissions are CO2, overwhelmingly driven by its heavy reliance on coal, which releases twice as much CO2 as natural gas and 40 percent more than oil, making coal consumption the most critical variable for its future impact on global warming.

While China's environmental problems are severe, they share historical parallels with other industrializing nations, such as Japan four decades ago or the United States in the 1960s, where similar issues of smog, burning rivers, and chemical pollution occurred. However, China is an 'environmental underperformer,' with its Environmental Performance Index score about 14 percent lower than its income level would predict. This underperformance is linked to characteristics it shares with other nations: an authoritarian post-Communist state with weak legal institutions, an 'East Asian developmental state' model prioritizing economic growth through industrialization, and superpower aspirations that often subordinate environmental concerns to industrial and technological development.

China primarily addresses its environmental issues through top-down administrative actions, as mechanisms like independent NGO activism, legal redress through class-action lawsuits, and unrestricted media exposés are tightly controlled. For example, a documentary on air pollution, 'Under the Dome,' was widely viewed but rapidly censored. Despite these limitations, there has been progress in controlling air pollution, now a national priority, driven by citizen pressure and recognition that long-term economic growth demands reduced energy intensity. Policy targets set in 2005 and 2011 achieved significant reductions in energy intensity (19 percent and 16 percent respectively), and coal's share of primary energy declined from a peak of 73 percent in 2005 to 66 percent in 2014. While sulfur dioxide emissions have fallen, PM 2.5 concentrations continued to rise until the government implemented a national action plan in September 2013, aiming for significant cuts in rich coastal provinces. Nevertheless, even optimistic officials anticipate 15 to 20 years before air quality in Chinese cities approaches developed-world standards, and critical work on water and soil contamination has barely begun.