(photo by Brian Snyder / Reuters)

Fifty miles outside of Beijing, a farm with more than three million chickens is collecting its daily torrent of guano, harvesting the methane, and using it to generate 14,600 megawatt hours of electricity a year, enough for more than 10,000 homes. That might not stave off the electricity shortages in Beijing's suburbs, but it will help.

The manure scheme is good news for everyone. In the past, the methane went into the atmosphere, contributing to climate change. The fecal matter seeped into the groundwater, potentially causing illness. Using the biogas from the manure instead of dirtier coal-fired power is expected to cut the equivalent of 95,000 tons of carbon dioxide each year.

Producing clean energy can also mean cleaning up at the bank. The farm, which is called the Beijing Deqingyuan Chicken Farm and Waste Utilization Plant, expects to save more than $1.2 million a year in electricity costs alone.

And by reducing carbon emissions, the project qualifies as a United Nations-sanctioned "Clean Development Mechanism," meaning that the farm is eligible to receive carbon credits. Under the Kyoto climate change treaty, the credits can be traded internationally, enabling companies to essentially purchase the right to pollute.

This project is one of many that China has seized upon, making it a world leader in clean energy. As President Barack Obama noted in his address to Congress in late February, “It is China that has launched the largest effort in history to make their economy energy efficient.”  

According to the World Bank, China has pledged to retire 50 gigawatts worth of inefficient power plants by 2010. The World Wind Energy Association reports that the country's wind energy capacity growth increased 107% in 2008 compared to the previous year.

The driving force behind this post-fossil fuel revolution is a 2005 Renewable Energy Law. The law compels power grid operators to buy all of the clean energy produced by registered plants, regardless of the price. It also requires them to connect the energy source to the grid, even though renewable projects tend to be remote. The legislation offers financial incentives such as government funds, discounted preferential lending and tax benefits.

The policy has been widely lauded by environmentalists. "There was a very clear set of government decisions as a result of a two or three year planning process. That created a renewable energy law that’s proven quite effective," said Christopher Flavin, President of the Worldwatch Institute, a Washington D.C. independent research organization.

Progress in China has been particularly rapid compared to the U.S., which finds itself tripping over partisan lines to get a comprehensive renewable energy law passed. In late June, the House of Representatives passed a bill emulating many of the Chinese law's core policies.

However, the bill is larded with pork for interest groups such as utilities, and lawmakers settled for emissions targets less potent than initially intended.

To be sure, the good news from China should be taken with a healthy dose of scepticism. The country's urban air remains abysmal, and the vast majority of its energy comes from dirty coal. Central government officials routinely celebrate the growing renewable energy capacity of massive projects, but the numbers advertised can be misleading, often assuming ideal scenarios of perfect weather year round. For example, the latest mega project, the recently unveiled $17.6 billion wind farm the "Three Gorges Dam on Land" is touting as having an installed capacity of 20 gigawatts by 2020. But as is typically the case with wind energy, the project will generate energy only about one-third of the time, due to the vicisitudes of weather.

For companies like GE Energy, which engineered the chicken farm power plant, China's energy policy has meant a vast new business opportunity. GE, which has been doing business in China on and off for a century, has not only embraced clean energy technology in the energy-hungry nation, but sees a future in its prominence. GE estimates that its share of the growth will be in the double digits in the next few years, says GE spokesman Geoff Li.

"This may have pretty big implications for us on the business side and on the environmental side," said Jack Wen, President of GE Energy China said. Already, GE Energy’s portfolio in China consists mostly of cleaner energy such as highly efficient gas turbines. “I don’t have any old technology anymore because China does not need me for that," he said.

Other energy companies are managing to find profit in failure. CWE Renewables, a Hong Kong-based wind energy start-up has acquired several failing, mismanaged wind projects and is working to turn them into profitable ventures. One such project is the Happy Wind Farm, in Inner Mongolia, which was in its nascent stages when capital ran out. CWE now has the exclusive rights to develop the farm to its planned 1,000 megawatt capacity.

Still, for all of China's progress in clean energy, it's hard to ignore the smoggy haze that hangs over Beijing. The country is still not willing to let go of the dirty, cheap coal that fuels its factories. At the G8 Summit in L'Aquila, Italy in early July, China refused to sign an agreement to halve greenhouse emissions by 2050, reminding the world of the country's real priority: economic development, the foundation of the government's legitimacy.

http://www.globalpost.com/passport/foreign-desk/090717/the-chicken-poop-solution