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As the world's two largest primary energy consumers, base oil demanders and greenhouse gas emitters, China and the United States have long searched for effective solutions to balance economic growth and address the increasingly urgent global environmental and energy problems. To seek mutually beneficial global solutions against the spiraling financial crisis, the US-China Green Tech Summit organized by Yangtze Council and Bay Area Council was held at Hyatt on the Bund Shanghai, November 13-14, 2008. More than 50 Chinese and US experts, including Gavin Newsom, Mayor of San Francisco, President of Bay Area Council, General Manager of Shanghai Urban Development and Investment Corporation, President of Yangtze Council, and Hari Reddy, Asia Pacific R&D Director of Dow Building Solutions, and various participants conducted in-depth discussions on such hot issues as innovative energy technology, energy efficiency and investment models for start-ups dedicated in environment-friendly industry.
Media Interview for Dow Building Solutions
Upon the high-end platform, the summit was the first gathering of leaders in business, academia and government circles from China and the United States, and it built up the platform for enterprises, NGOs and public sectors in the two countries to establish alliances. The 2-day forum consisted of keynote speeches, panel discussions and free discussions. During the panel discussion on November 13, Hari Reddy, Asia Pacific R&D Director of Dow Building Solutions, delivered an excellent speech on “Energy efficiency, sustainability and climate change”, drawing a great response from the audience. He shared his unique views on setting up the comprehensive energy policy. He expounded the four aspects of energy efficiency looks like the four pillars supporting a house, namely emphasis on energy efficiency and conservation, greater fuel and feedstock diversity including clean coal, safe nuclear and other renewable energy, a new political consensus on development of domestic natural gas resources, in addition to LNG and coal-bed methane, and improved infrastructure.
Hari Ready Speaking on US | China Green Tech Summit
As the bulky consumer of gross energy consumption, building energy conservation became a hot topic during the summit. Statistics show that, developed countries have been committed to research into this field after the energy crisis broke out in 1970s. Energy consumption for heating per unit size nowadays is three times as much in developed countries. While Chinese government has revealed its determination in 11th Five-Year Plan that, we will have to achieve the goal of 20% decline on unit GDP energy consumption among the year 2006 and 2010. The fact is, things did not go along all right. The statistics only dropped by 1.33% in 2006 and 3.66% in 2007, failing to achieve the goal of 4% per year. Therefore, we have to devote greater efforts towards energy conservation and even more going deep into details.
For the past 60 years, Dow has been regarded as the inventor of and leader in the Styrofoam insulation material field. With its unique blue color, Dow's Styrofoam™ Insulation Boards are now used in 21 million buildings around the world, saving some $9 billion worth of energy each year. Hari Reddy said: “The Building Sector accounts for about half of all energy consumption and green house gas emissions in the USA annually. In China it’s remarkably similar at 47%. As the globally leading building solution provider, Dow holds the responsibility to undertake its share towards the joint efforts on energy conservation.”
For Dow, sustainability is to ensure that every business decision---be it the R&D of a new product or the design and operation of a production base---must be made in a “responsible” way. As early as between 1995-2005, Dow formulated an ambitious “ten year goal for environmental, health and safety”. During these 10 years, Dow had increased output by 31% while reducing industrial emissions by 56%. It had also reduced solid waste discharge by 730,000 tons, enough to pile up by 1m over 270 football pitches; reduced waste water discharge by 83 million tons, equivalent to the water amount used in 800,000 Chinese families in 1 year; and saved 900 trillion BTU of energy, sufficient for use by 8 million US families in the whole 1 year.
In 2005, Dow also established its “2015 Sustainability Goals”, which covered 3 major aspects: to achieve “sustainable chemistry” through innovations and product stewardship, actively undertake its corporate social responsibilities (CSR); and reduce its environmental impact. Dow has included sustainability into its business strategy, and set up a chief sustainability officer and organized relevant teams. It provides environment-friendly, energy-saving solutions from various lifecycles of product R&D, production, commercial use and recycling.
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