Towards Development

The deputy director of Guangdong Development and Reform Commission and the deputy director of Guangdong Provincial Committee, China Association for Promoting Democracy, Lu Xiulu attended the 1^st Guangdong International CCUS Expert Workshop and UK-China (Guangdong) CCUS Centre Launch Ceremony hold on December 18, 2013, in Guangdong Province, and made the welcome address and the keynote speech titled “Towards Development”.

He said: “development still holds the key to resolve all issues in China, and this was highlighted as a major strategy in “Decision on Major Issues Concerning Comprehensively Deepening Reforms”. Reform is carried out to facilitate ‘development’, and highlighting ecologically motivation in the “Five-in-One” development strategy also aims for ‘development’. Because China still needs ‘development’, but China is now confronted with unprecedented and unavoidable environmental challenges and bottlenecks in the path of development. China's development will halt without reform; China's development will halt without a focus on creating an ecological civilization.”

“With rapid development in the past 30 years based on flexible policies, Guangdong's total GDP has led the country for more than a decade. However, the per capita GDP is well behind that of developed countries, and the basic public services are still at relatively low level. Consequently development is still at the top priority for Guangdong Province. Under the new scenario of a large, resource-consuming population, Guangdong provincial party committee and Guangdong provincial government dedicating to sustainable development exploration and innovation, creating an ecological civilization. Guangdong is achieving the national obligatory targets of energy intensity, carbon intensity and emission reductions by (i) promoting industrial restructuring, (ii)balancing development between regions, (iii) optimizing energy structure, (iv) implementing energy conservation and carbon reduction measures, and (v) demonstrating a carbon emission trading scheme. The efforts and exploration carried out by Guangdong Province will provide ‘positive energy’ towards future development. Promoting the revolution in energy production and consumption is a critical pathway and a strategic choice for an ecological civilization to take to break resource and environmental constraints and allow sustainable development in Guangdong Province. Inland inundation and haze caused by environmental pollution have recently become prominent in urban areas. The Guangdong Government, enterprises and society are gradually reaching broad consensus on the need to reduce the energy and carbon intensity of the provincial GDP and to strive for near-zero emissions. Of Guangdong's total energy consumption, coal contributes to 48.7% of primary energy and fossil fuel contributes to 83.6%, thus CCUS as one of the world's most significant emission reduction technologies, is essential for Guangdong's development. This consensus is acknowledged by enterprises within many sectors including power, cement.”

“CCUS is not far away from us. Guangdong Province can achieve CCUS to satisfy demand for energy consumption and allow environmental friendly development. To enable CCUS technologies to be widely applied, more in-depth studies and greater effort on ‘Near Zero Emission Technology’ are required on policies and regulations, technical standards, project demonstrations, industrialization patterns, integrated services, safety control and cost reductions. The establishment of “UK-China (Guangdong) CCUS Industry Promotion and Academic Collaboration Centre ” provides an open platform to promote CCUS exchange, cooperation and industrial development, and symbolizes the hard work and intelligence of all cooperating parties. “ he continued.

He hopes that the successful establishment and operation of this Centre will give a strong impetus to realizing Guangdong's concepts of near-zero emissions and sustainable development. “A thriving and prosperous Guangdong will enjoy clearer sky, greener land, cleaner water and a better environment for development. Let development benefit the people in Guangdong!” he added.