While China eclipsed the US as the largest national emitter of greenhouse gas in 2007, its 1.3 billion citizens are responsible for less per capita than the US and European Union, and below the global average. To help bring that figure down, further energy efficiency is ''the number one priority of the Chinese Government'', according to Wu. ''China's energy efficiency has improved dramatically but still, if you compare energy efficiency levels to other countries, China is still lagging behind,'' she said.
This is ably demonstrated in the percentage of various countries' economic stimulus packages devoted to green causes. South Korea led with 80%, while Australia trailed at about 9%. China provided a respectable 40% of a very large amount of stimulus spending.
Interestingly, with much of the discussion about the ETS in Australia devoted to how much protection to give the coal industry, CNN reports that in the US wind jobs have recently overtaken the number of coal mining jobs, which shows how big the clean energy industry has become.
