Clean Energy Technology Innovation Calls for an Assessment and Dissemination Platform

Speech by Mr. Shi Dinghuan, former General Secretary of the Ministry of Science & Technology,

former Counsellor of the State Council, Honorary Vice Chairman of the BEC.

(This is the transcript of the speech bythe author on the BEC’s TAD launch conference on April 23rd 2016.)

Dear Experts, Friends, and Members of theClub,

Good afternoon.

We will witness the BEC hold anotherimportant activity right here on this very day. Since its inception, the BEChas drawn extensive attention. Participants have included experts both fromChina and abroad, including senior officials, such as the IEA’s executivedirectors and Mr. Zhang Guobao, the first and former Administrator of theNational Energy Administration.

I see a lot of experts from the industry,academia and research institutions here today, many of whom are activeparticipants. The BEC provides a very good platform for experts to exchangeideas and thoughts. This platform is also an instrumental one for us to studyand discuss energy-related technology, policy and strategy issues. Dr. XavierChen, President of the Club, is a very warm-hearted person. He plans andorganizes every activity. People support him and help him. In my opinion, theClub is very active and explores a vast variety of issues.

China is pushing forward its energyrevolution and implementing its energy strategy. In this process, an organizationlike the BEC has been and always will be very instrumental in invigorating theclimate for science and technology innovation in the energy sector, creating abetter environment, and enhancing the close cooperation between Chinese andforeign energy communities. For every one of its activities, the BEC willgather people together from the government, the industry, the academia, theresearch community, the financial community, and the media, because all arerequired to thoroughly analyze an issue. This is no easy job.

Today, the Club will launch the CleanEnergy Technology Assessment & Dissemination (TAD) and use the energystorage technology of Dalian Rongke for the kick-start case study. This means alot. About half a year ago, i.e., last October, the Club held a meeting onenergy storage technology. Due to the lack of a platform for assessment, energystorage technologies were merely introduced on this occasion. To attend themeeting, Mr. Yang Zhenguo took a flight from the U.S.

The assessment today will be made fromseveral dimensions – technology, target market, policy, and environment. Ibelieve there can be more dimensions when the assessment is thorough enough.Also, the assessment system itself needs to keep improving.

I think it is very important to have an assessmentsystem because technology innovations in the energy sector are very dynamic inthe context of implementation of an innovation-driven national strategy. In thepast two years, the government has been working hard to promote massentrepreneurship and innovation, such that the President and the Premierthemselves are personally involved and are closely monitoring theimplementation. This means that China will be going very quickly on the road ofinnovation.

There was a time when China was just a followerof other countries’ technology innovation in many sectors. After years of hardwork, however, we started to implement the innovation-driven strategy in 2006.Since then, especially after the implementation of the medium- and long-termscientific development program and innovation strategy, China’s environment forinnovation has become better and better. Innovation is taking an increasinglyimportant position on the government’s agenda and has become a core nationalstrategy. Governments on all levels, including the Central Government, theState Council, and provincial, regional and local governments, are working hardto promote innovation. In spite of the many imperfections in terms of themacro-environment, policies, mechanisms, and public perceptions, China’scapabilities in innovation have improved significantly, be it innovation ineconomic development, social development, national defense, or coretechnologies.

Participation in this innovation “movement”is across the board, including the traditional main-forces such as state-ownedenterprises, ministry-level academies (Chinese Academy of Sciences), topuniversities, and high-tech zones. We also see an increasing amount ofinnovations from private companies, be they small- and medium-sized enterprisesor mini-sized enterprises. Given the multitude of technologies and innovations,there arises the issue of how we assess them, judge them, and better supportand develop them. To address this issue, I think it is very necessary that wehave a good assessment system and platform.

There are other organizations working onthis in China. For singing contests, there is The (Best) Voice of China. Forcooking contests, there is The (Best) Cook of China. What we are doing heretoday can be called The (Best) Technology of China. To identify if a goodtechnology is the best one, we need a platform and the means to make anassessment. The Asian Development Bank is also working on this. I am very happythat the ADB is very supportive of today’s activity and Mr. Zhai himself ispresent.

China today needs to introduce many foreigntechnologies, but China tomorrow will need to provide even more technologies tothe rest of the world. The technologies to be introduced and to be exported allneed to be assessed. In fact, not all good technologies are from renowneduniversities and we do see a lot of good technologies from private companies.There are a lot of self-taught innovators who are working on innovation at theexpense of their personal stakes. They require a theoretical guidance and anassessment system – an objective and neutral platform – to avoid detours andwrong directions.  

The BEC has very correctly selected energystorage for the launch of the TAD today because energy storage will take a moreand more important role in the whole new energy system, especially indistributed energy systems. Currently, however, it is in the initial stage ofinnovation and development and is yet to be industrialized. The TAD comes in atthe right time because it will help to identify and determine the directionsthrough assessment and better assist technology-focused companies to resolveimminent issues so that the technologies are better promoted, industrializedand applied.

In a nutshell, I consider the platform tobe of great importance. We will soon witness a case study of energy storage onthe platform using the assessment system developed by BEC. I think this is verymeaningful for everyone present. I am very pleased to attend this activity andwish it great success. It is my hope that a lot of the innovative technologies,whether mature or immature, in whatever stage of development, in many cleanenergy sectors are assessed and disseminated through the TAD. I also hope thatthe BEC discovers more high-quality technologies through the TAD so that theymake up China’s future portfolio of core technologies and becomeinternationally leading technologies. This is the BEC’s practical contributionto promoting the national innovation-driven strategy. I conclude with my bestwishes for today’s activity. Thank you very much.