DESSC Finds a Green Partner in China

On Secretary of State John Kerry’s first trip to China, the U.S. and China established the U.S.-China Working group under the Strategic and Economic Dialogue.  Mr. Todd Stern, U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change, and Mr. Xie Zhenhua, Vice Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, jointly lead the Working Group.

This week, Mr. Stern and Mr. Xie gathered again in Arlington, Virginia to convene the 4th U.S.-China Energy Efficiency Forum as part of the Climate Change Working Group’s dialogue on energy efficiency in building and industry. Following their opening remarks, three MOUs were signed.   One of these included DESSC. Chris Hankin, DESSC Executive Director and Mingliang Liu, Deputy Secretary of the Chinese Institute of Electronics (CIE) signed the “Memorandum of Understanding in Promotion of Energy Efficiency through Electronic Information Technology.”  

In the face of mounting energy efficiency and emission reduction challenges in the U.S. and China, the two organizations agreed to cooperatively promote the enabling role that technology plays in limiting carbon footprints and driving long-term economic growth. DESSC and CIE plan to engage global technology leaders, research institutes, customers and other stakeholders to gather the best and brightest minds from both US and China.  This ambitious initiative, which includes specific deliverables, can serve as another important piece of the U.S.-China bilateral dialogue seeking to promote economic prosperity and job creation while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Green ICT offers a tremendous amount of operational efficiency to data centers, transportation systems, and infrastructure facilities. Mounting environmental pressures present challenges as well as opportunities for the Chinese government to transform their economy in a sustainable way.  At the same time, increasingly stringent budget constraints are pushing the U.S. government to look harder at ways it can reduce energy consumption and costs while increasing productivity. The ICT industry’s cutting edge innovation can serve as a catalyst for this needed transformation in both nations. This MOU is only the beginning of DESSC-CIE cooperation to help unleash this great potential.

Public Policy Tags: Intelligent Efficiency

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