USCC: Energy & Environment

Colleague Thomas Del Monte sent me a link to the Annual Report to Congress of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) telling that it came up in a discussion he was having with someone about China's CER investment practices. I flipped the report open to page 8 of the Executive Summary which summarizes China's Energy and Environmental Policies and Activities. I had mixed reactions, but I thought it would be a good idea to read around before I got to typing.

Stan Abrams has a fine post at China Hearsay on the USCC, which he dubs the “Unbelievably Scary China Committee”. The post is in the Panda Punchers series which gives you an idea of what he thinks of the report. Mr. Abrams reproduces several choice findings in the Report detailing the xenophobia (too strong of a word?) of the Commission.

The early parts of the energy and environmental summary fall into this same xenophobic trap: China's cheap dirty coal fired energy generation is choking us all; the vast bureaucracy and the disconnect between central and local governments prevents any real gains from happening; China supports bad guys by buying oil from whomever. Below are some of the most damning accusations:

• "If China’s underlying environmental problems are not addressed effectively, this could become another source of unrest that could challenge the Chinese Communist Party’s control of the country."
• "China aids regimes operating contrary to U.S. foreign policy interests, such as the genocidal government in Sudan and Iran’s government that is attempting to develop its own nuclear capability."
• "The bilateral relationships China is building around the world ... have resulted in an
  increase of its global economic, political, diplomatic, and cultural influence that has the potential to challenge U.S. interests."
• "China’s naval modernization is targeted not only on a Taiwan scenario but also on protecting China’s economic resource supply chains."

Pretty ominous stuff... There might be some truth there, but the theme is: China Bad! Imagine my surprise then, when I read the Commission's "Prospects for Addressing the Effects of China’s Energy Consumption":

• "Success in addressing China’s energy challenges will require the Chinese government to focus on correcting the structural weaknesses within its energy policymaking apparatus."
• "Cooperative projects that promote and support the collection and reporting of sufficiently detailed energy and environmental data will contribute substantially to China’s ability to address challenges in these fields and to the ability of the United States and other nations to provide real encouragement and targeted assistance to those efforts."
• "U.S.-China cooperation on energy and the environment is a crucial component for addressing the energy challenges that both countries face."
• "China presents an opportunity to develop and apply U.S. energy technologies on a large commercial scale that will increase the viability of these technologies on the market."

These prospects and solutions are focused around cooperation between the U.S. and China which stand in contrast to the energy and environmental problems which are focused on China as a threat. Cooperation always seems to be the most beneficial method of proceeding, but getting nations to cooperate has been, at best, difficult over the years. These solutions also suggest why the Commission paints such a scary picture of China: if cooperation is the only solution to these scary geopolitical concerns, then Congress is going to need to cooperate. This is an interesting and risky tactic. If China becomes too scary to Congress and the American people, cooperation, no matter how beneficial, will not become an option. Mistrust and misunderstandings by two Allies in the first half of the past century dissolved any chance at cooperation and precipitated a chill across the other half of the century resulting in a Wall, a Crisis, and a host of land wars in Asia.