China Textile Magazine Article: The Power of NGOs in Driving Industrial Energy Efficiency
Posted below with the permission of the author, Xu Huan, is the English translation of an article about NRDC’s Responsible Sourcing Initiative (RSI) which appeared in China Textile Magazine‘s June Issue:
In today’s society, due to the constant growth of the market economy, all production units and individuals have a dual identity; they are both consumers and producers. Any company or individual can make a substantial contribution to environmental protection through promoting green sourcing. This is our undeniable duty.
The Power of NGOs in Driving Industrial Energy Efficiency
Written by Xu Huan
The starting point of a green textile trade
At the first International Textile Industry Green Summit, held on March 29th in Changshu, Jiangsu Province, partners from Changshu and Jiangsu Province came together with NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) to kick off “The Textile Industry’s Best Practice City,” a project aimed at helping textile enterprises in Changshu contribute to the low-carbon economy and sustainable development. This marks a major step taken by NRDC’s Responsible Sourcing Initiative (RSI). Through influencing the purchasing orientation of multinational garment retailers and well-known brands, this initiative aims to help textile mills in the supply chain control pollution and promote environmental protection.
Other initiators of RSI also include Wal-Mart, Gap, Levi, H&M, Nike and Li & Fung—the most influential multinational buyers in the world. With these major buyers at the top of the supply chain on board, this project exudes a unique kind of power. According to Franky, the director of Gap’s environmental affairs, Gap has been committed to social responsibility work for 15 years, and its efforts have steadily evolved from simple priorities such as labor protection to include more complex ones such as water resource conservation, energy development and environmental protection. “Some jobs can not be done single-handedly. In 2010, we will focus on the supply chain, training enterprises both up and downstream and setting requirements of clean production and energy saving for our raw materials suppliers.”
Gap, Wal-Mart, Nike and the like are not alone in having transformed their Corporate Social Responsibility Departments into a “Sustainability Departments.” Mr. Chen Jie, the former Director of Fabric for Wal-Mart’s Global Fabric Sourcing Office, noted that in October of 2008, Wal-Mart established its Department of Sustainability, setting higher social responsibility requirements for the company itself and advancing incentives for energy savings and emissions reductions in the supply chain. The company also requires that its top 200 Chinese suppliers reach a 20% goal in energy efficiency and emissions reduction. Nike was also one of the companies to realize consumers’ demand for green products, so the company has been working on environmental protection and circular usage for years. Bob, the Director of E2 Nike, disclosed that from 2010, Nike will require that environmental protection and energy efficiency in the manufacturing process be taken into account starting in the design phase. Nike will also pay careful attention to the impact of the product’s life cycle on the environment.
In any case, the measures being adopted by these sourcing giants indicate that the trend of global consumption is gradually being pushed towards “sustainability” and “green” brands. Being green and environmentally friendly will eventually become the undeniable hard index of manufacturers.
It is worth mentioning that the “Textile Industry’s Best Practice City” is confined to textile mills in Changshu. This shows, on the one hand, that Changshu textile companies are working diligently to improve their environmental profile and, on the other hand, that the giants at the end of the supply chain are paying more attention to Changshu. Through close collaboration with NRDC’s RSI, Changshu has taken the lead in implementing energy efficiency and environmental protection management, emerging as the starting point of green textile trade between the Chinese textile industry and international clients. This presents the city with an opportunity to enter the international green trade sourcing chain for textile products. The municipal government of Changshu holds high expectations for this undertaking. In the kick-off ceremony, Mayor Hui Jianlin clearly stated that “the city will deepen its cooperation with NRDC and co-found a mechanism for long-term cooperation. Under the support of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Jiangsu’s Environmental Protection Bureau, we will shape Changshu into a green Davos in the international textile industry.”
RSI is not a means that these international end buyers use to simply shirk their social responsibility for environmental protection. The first benefit for Changshu mills that joined RSI via the “Textile Industry’s Best Practice City” program is that they are provided a free, mill-specific energy efficiency assessment and methods for improvement by industry experts. To minimize the cost and impact on production of these changes, the experts begin with the front line of production, with the equipment currently available. They select some improvement measures that are easy to implement, require low investment and enjoy a short payback period (around 8 months). At the project kick-off ceremony, a handbook called “NRDC’s Ten Best Practices for Textile Mills to Save Money and Reduce Pollution” was distributed to Changshu mills. The manual describes in detail ten measures that help to save water, energy and money, which are universally applicable to Chinese textile dyeing and finishing mills，as well as input and output ratios.
The manual does not recommend expensive equipment or a systematic overhaul, but rather emphasizes “improving measurement systems,” “leakage checking and preventative maintenance,” “steam traps maintenance,” “insulation of pipelines and valves,” “condensate/cooling water reuse,” “heat recovery,” “compressed air system optimization” and other easy measures for enhanced energy efficiency in the production process. Since 2006, NRDC RSI has collaborated with the Jiangsu Academy of Environmental Sciences to set up an expert team for process control, pollution reduction and energy auditing. Over the course of three years, through dozens of mill visits and the in-depth analysis of several others, the RSI team selected this set of best practices with regard to environmental protection as a stepping-stone towards altering the mills’ mindsets and elevating their performance. “At little or no cost, we can improve the efficiency of the dyeing and finishing process, as well as energy and resource efficiency to significantly ramp up environmental performance. The benefits of energy saving are great enough to repay the efficiency investment within a period of only a few months.” Cindy Lin, an NRDC Associate, encouraged enterprise delegates to adopt these efficiency measures by emphasizing their economic benefits. By the end of the kick-off ceremony, almost ten enterprises registered for the RSI project.
Obtaining the commitment of multinational buyers and the Changshu government, the cooperation of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the experts’ pro bono consulting, and the easy and effective “Ten Best Practices,” it is, perhaps, surprising to find that the driving force behind the mobilization of so many resources, completion of design projects, handling of on-the-ground work and launching of the “China Station” for green trade of global textiles, came from an NGO which is not even remotely related to the textile industry–NRDC.
China Textile Magazine Article: For Beautiful Mountains and Water
Posted below with the permission of the author, Xu Huan, is the English translation of an interview of NRDC Global Environment and Health Program Director, Dr. Linda Greer, which appeared in China Textile Magazine‘s June issue:
For Beautiful Mountains and Water
–An interview with NRDC Global Environment and Health Program Director, Dr. Linda Greer.
Written by Xu Huan
China Textile: In your 30 years of environmental protection experience, what do you find are the differences between the textile industry and other industries? What are the challenges to environmental protection in the textile industry?
Linda: In most other industries, water is mainly used in the cooling process—where water is heated, but the water quality remains unchanged—however, given their production features, textile mills not only guzzle water, but also contaminate it. Textile mills use water in the dyeing and rinsing processes, the result to process water being that it is polluted. The most damaging pollutants contained within discharged water are oxygen-depleting molecules. When discharged into rivers, these molecules absorb available oxygen, thereby damaging the flora and fauna. What’s more, the hazardous heavy metals and chemicals contained in the dye threaten the environment and drinking water further downstream, which poses a challenge for treatment.
China Textile: What does the future of RSI (Responsible Sourcing Initiative) hold? How many plants can be changed?
Linda: Our plan is to encourage a few hundred mills to join our initiative. The short-term goal is to work with 20 mills in Changshu, or about 20% of all the dyeing and finishing mills in the city. We want to make Changshu “The Best Practice City,” so 20 mills could be representative. While these projects are underway, we will also work on facilities in other cities, but this work will depend on the interest of multinational buyers in those facilities.
Zijin Mining Group’s Inadequate Disclosure of China Acid Spill – What Needs to be Done?
[11 Chinese environmental groups issued a letter to the Hong Kong and Shanghai Stock Exchanges last week calling for greater environmental transparency for listed companies in the aftermath of the Zijin Mining chemical spill: NGO呼吁沪港两交易所完善上市公司信息披露制. NRDC supports this call and signs on to the letter. The following is an English translation of the original letter.]
Regarding Zijin Mining Group’s Suspected Intentional Delay in
Disclosing Information about its Pollution Incident
An Open Letter to the
Hong Kong Stock Exchange and Shanghai Stock Exchange
Hong Kong Stock Exchange and Shanghai Stock Exchange:
We would like to call to the attention of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEx) and Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) the actions of the listed company Zijin Mining Group (2899.HK, 601899.SH). This company has been suspected of inappropriate acts and deliberate delay in the disclosure of information related to a major pollution incident. We request that the HKEx and SSE thoroughly carry out an investigation into this matter. Following verification that violations were committed, we request that the HKSE and SSE issue a public denouncement and appropriate punishment. Concurrently, we call on the HKEx and SSE to improve their institutional rules and regulations regarding information disclosure to ensure effective protection of the environment and affected communities, and to uphold investor interests.
According to an article published by Xinhua News Agency on July 3, 2010, an incident occurred at the Zijin Mining Group’s Zijinshan Copper Mine. The incident involved a leak of 9,100 cubic meters of acid from the plant’s wet sewage facilities into the Ting River, resulting in serious pollution and the death of 1890 tons of aquatic life. The Zijin Mining Group not only delayed public announcement of this grevious incident for a period of nine days but also claimed that the reason for the pollution incident was due to rainfall, stating, “this leakage incident is primarily related to natural disaster. It was impossible to predict.”[1]
This statement clearly contradicts official judgements rendered on the case. Read more…
Job Posting – NRDC China Environmental Law Consultant
NRDC is currently accepting applications for a consultant to its China Environmental Law Project to be based in Beijing. Applications will be handled on a rolling basis.
NRDC China Environmental Law Consultant
NRDC Beijing Office Job Opportunities
NRDC’s Beijing office is currently accepting applications for the positions of Policy Analyst and Industrial Engineer.
Detailed job descriptions as well as requisite qualifications and application instructions are contained in the attached job postings.
Industrial Engineer Job Posting
Assessing the State of Environmental Transparency in China
I was in Weihai (en), a 2.5 million person city in eastern Shandong Province, last month to talk about environmental transparency with more than 50 government officials and scholars from around China. As far as I am aware, this is the largest gathering to date of Chinese government officials focused on implementation of China’s Open Government Information Regulations and Open Environmental Information Measures, which went into effect on May 1, 2008. The workshop in Weihai, which we co-sponsored with Environmental Protection Magazine, the Wendeng Municipal Government and the Institute for Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE), was a chance for government officials responsible for open information work to come to share their experiences and exchange ideas.
This event also marked the launch of a new 76-page report from IPE and NRDC analyzing the first year of implementation of China’s open information regulations. A Chinese version of the report – Breaking the Ice on Open Environmental Information: 2008 Pollution Information Transparency Index (PITI) – can be downloaded here. An English version will be available before the end of the June.
This report is a follow-up to our announcement of preliminary results last year, and contains an in-depth look at transparency practices around China, and an introduction to international practices in environmental transparency. In particular, this report contains a substantial amount of new analysis about last year’s findings.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
As announced last year, there was good news and bad, and the PITI analysis highlighted some thorny issues that will need to be dealt with if environmental transparency is to truly take flight in China.
- The good. Many of China’s cities have made a good start on open information. We’ve highlighted an “all-star” team made up of the top-performing cities in each of 8 categories of information evaluated – Shanghai, Taizhou, Shenzhen, Lianyungang, Beijing, Shaoxing, Kunming, and Hefei. The all-star team received a near-perfect score on our PITI scale: 89.5 out of 100. The take-away here is that some cities have already begun to demonstrate positive performance on open information in China. The argument that China is not ready or not yet developed enough to engage in good environmental transparency just does not hold water.
- The bad. Overall performance on transparency was low: just over 30 points out of 100. Full compliance with current legal requirements would earn a city over 60 points.
- The ugly. Many cities with heavy pollution tended also to have low disclosure. Only 24% of cities (27 of 113) actually responded to public information requests for information clearly listed in regulations as legally-required disclosure. Many cities used too-expansive interpretations of “commercial secrets” exemptions and other legal provisions to withhold information from the public. There still is no reliable forum or channel for the public to challenge inappropriate decisions to withhold information.
We make a series of recommendations to address these challenges, including: clarifying the scope of disclosure (by judicial interpretation and environmental ministry guidance), establishing fair and impartial dispute resolution mechanisms to deal with inevitable disagreements, and disclosing information – such as facility-level pollutant emissions data and environmental impact assessment reports – that is not now required to be disclosed.
Progress on Open Information in 2009
The Weihai workshop was a chance for government officials to report on their progress on information disclosure. One would hope and expect to see improvement in implementation as cities have now had two years to build up systems and staffing for information disclosure. A few developments worth noting:
- Most Improved. The western city of Lanzhou, one of China’s most polluted, was also one of the worst performing cities in our PITI evaluation. Lanzhou came in 92nd out of 113 in 2008 with a mere 16.6 points. Based on their presentation at Weihai, Lanzhou may be in the running for “most improved” in our upcoming 2009 PITI ranking. Lanzhou is about to launch a major new website with a wide range of information disclosure and they have expressed a commitment to better response to public information requests. We’ll be looking out for their performance as we complete our new ranking, to be released in the fall of 2010.
- Improvement in Responses to Information Requests. A team of researchers is now carrying out the second PITI evaluation. Early research is showing a higher response rate for public information requests. A full report will appear in the 2nd annual PITI evaluation.
- Good News from Around the Country. A number of other cities reported interesting developments. An official from Yunnan Province noted that as their information disclosure improved, it reduced the burden placed on monitoring officials, who previously received countless requests from the public to perform monitoring of environmental quality because the information was not regularly disclosed to the public. An environmental official from Huangshi, a city near Wuhan in central China not in last year’s PITI, told us that their city had just received an RMB 800 million project from the central government to pilot open government information. Dalian noted that it had connected its 12369 complaint hotline with a web platform, such that all complaints are automatically registered online for public viewing. We’ll report on more case studies in our new ranking and report in the fall.
We have seen progress and bright spots among the cities evaluated. The question is whether the cases we have seen are exceptions or indicative of broader trends. As we complete our new 2009 PITI ranking for the period from May 1, 2009 to May 1, 2010, we will be looking out for signs of improvement and any retrenchment. Stay tuned for the results later this year.
The China Economic Times and the Legal Daily covered the workshop (Chinese: here, here and here; Google Translate (English): 1, 2, 3).
Recent Environmental Law and Public Participation News
Thirty four environmental organizations issue joint letter on heavy metal pollution (Google translation)
Led by the Institute for Public and Environmental Affairs and the Beijing-based Friends of Nature, a group of 34 environmental organizations issued a joint letter last week calling on electronics manufacturers to take responsibility for their heavy metal pollution. The companies the letter targeted include electronics giants Canon, Panasonic, Nokia, Sony, and over 30 other leading brands. Heavy metal pollution remains a serious environmental challenge in China with new cases of contamination and poisoning publicized almost weekly. Manufacturing processes used in the electronics industry, particularly for printed circuit boards and battery manufacturing, are known to contribute to the problem. (Source: hexun.com)
89% of drinking water from China’s seven great rivers not meeting standards (Google translation)
A study of China’s seven major rivers has found that over 89% of the rivers contain water unsuitable for human consumption, a newspaper reported. With over 2000 different pollutants present in China’s water, some rivers, such as the Haihe River Basin and the Liao River, are still registering at least 40% of greater of their water at Grade V, the worst water quality level. (Source: Phoenix News Network)
Yunnan CPPCC members being face-to-face talks on public interest litigation reform (Google translation)
Members of the Yunnan Provincial CPPCC met last week with the Yunnan Procuratorate to finalize plans for moving forward on legislation intended to bolster environmental public interest litigation in the province. The legislation drafting process first started this January when several CPPCC members put forward proposals. Among the improvements in the new law include efforts to improve communication and cooperation as well as an expansion of enforcement and prosecution powers to better prepare Yunnan officials to handle contingencies such as the 2008 Yangzonghai Lake arsenic pollution disaster. (Source: Procuratorate Daily)
The American Power Act: “First Read” of the Kerry-Lieberman Climate and Energy Legislation
《美国电力法案》：克里-利伯曼 气候与能源立法——NRDC专家的初步解读
Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) unveiled today the long-awaited draft of their American Power Act. The launch of their bill kicks off an intensive effort to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation in the Senate this summer, reconcile it with the bill passed by the House, and put a final bill on the president’s desk to sign into law this year.
As the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster continues to unfold with tragic consequences, it has become painfully clear that America needs a safer, cleaner approach to energy development. Congress must enact a comprehensive clean energy and climate bill this year that puts America back in control of our energy situation. This draft bill gets us moving in the right direction.
Here is NRDC’s “first read” of the American Power Act discussion draft, compiled with the assistance of our staff experts in each of the areas that the legislation addresses. Our staff will be diving deeper into parts of the bill in posts to follow in the coming days. We’ll also update this overview as necessary.
The core carbon pollution limits in the bill, covering all major pollution sources, are a solid foundation for Senate legislation.
- The bill would amend the Clean Air Act to establish steadily declining limits on carbon emission from the major sectors responsible for America’s carbon pollution, including electricity production, heavy industry, and transportation.
- It includes an auction system with major dividends to consumers that start right away and increase over time.
- It includes cost reduction mechanisms and market safeguards, as well as measures to invest in key energy technologies, level the playing field for American manufacturing, and promote innovation and job creation.
The bill does include troubling provisions to curtail some current Clean Air Act authorities and to preempt some state programs.
Recent Climate Change News in the Chinese Media
China proposes carbon tax after 2012 (Google translation)
China is considering the creation of a climate tax as early as 2012, according to a recent study completed the Energy Research Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Finance. The tax would be devised by changing the current resource tax of 2% into a carbon tax to be levied on enterprises; the tax would charge 10 RMB per ton of carbon dioxide starting in 2012 and will then be increased to 40 RMB by 2020. Though much still needs to be completed before implementation, receiving the support of NDRC and MOF represents a major step forward for putting a price on carbon in China. (Source: Economic Information Daily)
China’s renewable energy development still needs coherent legislative support (Google translation)
At a “green forum” hosted by Sohu earlier this week, Dr. Ren Dongming of the National Development and Reform Commission spoke about the road ahead for renewable energy in China. He identified two major legal measures that still must be confirmed before robust deployment of renewable energy technology and development: the operational function and use of the renewable energy fund in China; and regulation of a renewable energy quota system for renewables. Ren hopes that firmer legislative on these issues will resolve some of the current difficulties in connecting renewable energy to the grid and transporting renewable energy to other locations around the country. (Source: Legal Daily)
Sinoma Tech begins work on constructing 3MW wind turbine blades in Jiuquan, Gansu province (Google translation)
In April of this year, Sinoma Technology invested 238 million RMB to construct a massive wind turbine plant that is expected to have an annual output of 300 sets of 3MW turbines. Projected annual sales for the plant are over 600 million RMB, let alone the creation of more than 500 new jobs. The factory is expected to start operation in November 2010, and many of the turbines will go toward a 10 million KW wind power base being constructed in Jiuquan. (Source: Joint News Agency)
Recent Climate Change News in the Chinese Media
Low-carbon economy “ripens” new energy industry (Google translation)
Building upon three years of policies and laws promoting the development and expansion of renewable energy programs, wind power has finally entered a commercial operation stage, according to He Dexin, president of the Chinese Wind Energy Association. While wind power clearly stands out as China’s most mature new energy industry, the industry continues to suffer from lack of highly trained human resources; He claimed that every wind farm needs a management team of at least 25 people to be effective. In addition, many key players in China’s renewable energy field recognize that more specific policies will be needed to bolster the enormous investment opportunities available in wind and other renewable technology industries: the International Energy Agency estimates that China will need 3.7 trillion USD to meet domestic goals for renewable energy to compose 15% of energy use by 2020. (Source: China High-Tech Industry Review)
Smart grid allows clean energy to “generate” and “transmit” (Google translation)
The State Grid Corporation of China released its first “green development” white-paper last week detailing domestic industries’ role in connecting clean energies to the national power grid. Although transportation of produced energy continues to pose a considerable challenge for deployment and use of energy produced from hydropower, wind, and other clean energy sources, the State Grid Corporation remains optimistic: the white-paper declares an active commitment to increasing efficiency in energy containment and processing, and predicts that by 2020 clean energies will make up 32 – 33% of the total installed capacity, or 4.9 – 5.7 hundred million kilowatts; this is estimated to be equivalent to the reduction of 10.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide (Source: Science & Technology Daily)
“Two-track system” is still the foundation of negotiations (Google translation)
After the first UN climate negotiations ended in Bonn, Germany, multiple unresolved issues loom in the upcoming months prior to COP16 in Cancun this December. Verbalizing perhaps one of the most contentious principles of the international climate debate, this article reiterates the absolute necessity to uphold “common but differentiated” responsibilities in the form of a well-defined two-track system for approaching emissions reductions. Indeed, in order for China and other developing nations to sign on to a legally binding agreement by the end of the year, the writer asserts, distinctions in commitments must be maintained for developed and developing nations. (Source: People’s Daily)