Electricity With Chinese Characteristics: The Complexities of Decarbonizing China's Power Sector

Join Jon Wellinghoff, Jim Williams and Fritz Kahrl for a discussion of US-China energy cooperation, and learn about China's electricity sector.

Speakers
Jon Wellinghoff, Federal Electricity Regulatory Commission
Jim Williams, Energy and Environmental Economics and Monterey Institute of International Studies
Fritz Kahrl, Energy and Resources Group, U.C. Berkeley

Over the past year there has been a series of new initiatives on U.S.-China energy cooperation focused on low-carbon development, covering renewables, energy efficiency, clean vehicles, and carbon capture and storage. Central to the long-term success of these initiatives will be strengthening the currently low understanding of China’s electricity sector. How China’s reforms of the power sector could pose valuable lessons for the United States is a topic rarely explored. At this meeting speakers will discuss some of the key ways in which China’s power system differs from the U.S. and how the operations, planning, and regulation of China’s electricity grid affect its emission reduction prospects.