Author: Zou Zhenjie Xu Yanyan Ma Chenchen Jiya
Under the goal of carbon neutrality and peak carbon dioxide emissions, how will human society realize the key transformation? How will the development model and technological innovation path be formulated?
From August 12th to 13th, the "2021 Zero Carbon Summit" sponsored by CBN was held in Shanghai. This summit discussed the future trend of green low-carbon economy from the perspectives of energy reform, urban sustainable development, carbon market analysis, green building and green finance.
Huang Zhen, an academician of China Academy of Engineering and dean of the Institute of Carbon Neutralization Development of Shanghai Jiaotong University, said at the summit that the energy reform under the goal of "double carbon" is a gradual process. To "stand first and then break", we should first establish a "four pillars and eight pillars" of low-carbon development from the aspects of technology, policies and regulations and market mechanism, and then gradually reduce fossil energy and build a clean, zero-carbon, safe and efficient energy system. Lai Xiaoming, chairman of Shanghai Environment (601200, Share Bar) Energy Exchange, said that building and improving the carbon market is not only the spot of emission quotas and emission reductions, but also multiple derivatives, and it will be a multi-level and diversified market in the future.
Yang Yudong, editor-in-chief of CBN, said in his speech that it is foreseeable that green development and low-carbon economy will become the vane of the whole industry and help achieve the development goal of green economy, which has become the general consensus of global enterprises, investors and financial institutions.
There is no contradiction between carbon emission reduction and economic growth
"China will reduce carbon dioxide emissions while ensuring stable economic growth. How should we view the relationship between peak carbon dioxide emissions, carbon neutrality and economic and social development? " When talking with two academicians of China Academy of Engineering, Yang Yudong raised a topic that attracted much attention from the industry.
"I think this is a misunderstanding. Carbon emissions and economic development are not antagonistic and contradictory, but a different track, which is very important." Huang Zhen said.
Huang Zhen said that at present, we need to reduce carbon emissions, and renewable energy is an important link, and the scale of renewable energy in China ranks first in the world. Therefore, regardless of wind power or photovoltaic, China is a major supplier in the world. The goal of "double carbon" will spur greater opportunities for industrial development. To achieve carbon neutrality in China, it may take hundreds of trillions of investments and decades of efforts, which will also shape higher-quality economy and employment, a more beautiful ecological environment and more advanced science and technology.
Yang Yudong said that the energy revolution and economic development are not contradictory, and real smart people will regard it as a huge opportunity. China has the best innovation environment for carbon neutrality in the world, and related technologies and models can be developed on a large scale.
So, is the existing energy technology enough to support this energy revolution?
"The energy revolution needs a safe and reliable way, which is a gradual process." Huang Zhen said that to "stand first and then break", we should first establish a "four beams and eight pillars" of low-carbon development from the aspects of technology, policies and regulations and market mechanism, and then gradually reduce fossil energy and build a clean, zero-carbon, safe and efficient energy system.
Therefore, Huang Zhen proposed a clean, zero-carbon, safe and efficient energy system model in the future: with a high proportion of renewable energy of "new energy+energy storage" as the main body and "CCUS)+ nuclear energy" as the guarantee.
On the goal of combining enterprise development with carbon emission reduction, Wu Zhiqiang, a professor at Tongji University, an academician of the China Academy of Engineering and a counselor of the Shanghai Municipal Government, said: "If an enterprise wants to set up a factory, it must follow the footsteps of others according to the traditional industrialization model. However, by changing our thinking, we can actually introduce a series of low-carbon and energy-saving new models such as hydrogen energy housing at the architectural level. "
On the more advanced carbon sink calculation technology, Wu Zhiqiang said that in 2018, he and his team completed the statistics of sample carbon use and emissions in 13,810 cities around the world.
"The total amount of carbon emissions varies greatly among cities in China, and the gap between some cities has about 20 times the growth space. If we accurately monitor the carbon sink capacity per square kilometer, we will find that some bamboo forests have strong carbon sink capacity, including the concept and scene of roof greening, before we can break this topic. "
Therefore, Wu Zhiqiang called on cities to design carbon emission reduction curves accurately according to their own land characteristics, and relevant experts also need to constantly learn the technologies and face peak carbon dioxide emissions and carbon neutrality with a reformed and innovative attitude, which is a systematic reform issue.
Improve the carbon market system
Carbon trading system is one of the most effective tools to achieve carbon emission reduction at low cost. Since the launch of the national carbon emission trading market on July 16 this year, this field has attracted the attention of the industry.
At the summit, Lai Xiaoming analyzed the operation of the national carbon market around the formation mechanism, influencing factors and future development of carbon prices.
Lai Xiaoming believes that compared with the capital market, the national carbon market is a small-scale and highly specialized market, mainly focusing on serving the "double carbon" goal and low-cost emission reduction of service enterprises, while building and improving the carbon market is not only the spot of emission quotas and emission reduction, but also multiple derivatives. It will be a multi-level and diversified market in the future.
At the initial stage of operation, the main trading entities in the national carbon market are mainly key enterprises in charge, and the trading varieties are mainly spot carbon quotas, so the overall trading volume of the market is not large. To this end, the Shanghai Stock Exchange has determined the future management goals. "The first thing is to ensure the standardized and compliant operation of the market, which is the foundation; The second is to ensure that the market price fluctuates within a reasonable range and make the market run smoothly; The third is to promote the growth of transaction scale. " Lai Xiaoming said.
In order to develop and serve diversified market demand, Lai Xiaoming said that the future will enrich the trading varieties; At the same time, research will be introduced into the market maker mechanism to allow institutional investors to enter the carbon market; Provide diversified carbon financial management tools; Promote the concept of carbon neutrality, and the government formulates policies to encourage enterprises to reduce emissions. In this way, more enterprises will participate in market transactions in the future.
In the carbon market system, what kind of trading mechanism is more conducive to the discovery of carbon price?
Qi Kang, deputy chief engineer of Shanghai Energy Conservation and Emission Reduction Center, said that the carbon price currently formed should effectively promote enterprises to reduce emissions; At the same time, the formation of carbon price should also take into account the safety of energy supply. At present, China’s coal-fired power plants are affected by the rise in commodity prices, resulting in a large loss, so carbon price should also consider some cost factors; In addition, we need to consider the energy market under construction, and the electricity and natural gas markets are gradually advancing, which also has a linkage effect with the carbon price.
Li Jin, deputy general manager of Shanghai Environment and Energy Exchange, said that in the initial stage, the price of carbon on the one hand makes enterprises feel the cost pressure of emissions, and if they do emission reduction, they can be encouraged to some extent. In the future investment decisions of enterprises, carbon price will be taken into account as a long-term influencing factor, because we did not consider carbon price as a constraint in the past. The future carbon price is a factor that affects the long-term project investment of enterprises and changes the cost-benefit structure, especially it is a dynamic factor.
ESG investment value geometry
Under the goal of double carbon, ESG investment has become the key word in the capital market.
Zhao Yonggang, general manager of research and development department and ESG business department of China Securities Index Co., Ltd., said in his keynote speech that ESG has become the main starting point for financial markets to implement the carbon-neutral strategy. Although ESG investment in the domestic market started late, it developed rapidly as a whole. However, there are still two main obstacles in the development of ESG investment: first, there is no unified consensus ESG standard, and the results of various evaluation agencies are very different; Second, ESG has little practical experience in investment and lacks large-scale investment.
In his keynote speech, Cao Jin, managing partner of KPMG’s financial risk management in China, stressed that the financial risk management under the dual-carbon strategy can not be ignored. From the perspective of risk managers, it is necessary to identify, evaluate and measure such risks. For example, how green or brown, true green or false green an enterprise is, we must make an objective rating. This work needs a lot of data, models and industry experts to jointly promote.
Cao Jin said that another feature of financial investment risk comes from the long-term effect of climate risk, that is, some enterprises think that it is not an urgent problem to discharge more pollutants. Usually, stress testing or situational analysis will be used to judge internationally. He also suggested building a series of advanced evaluation methods with the advantages of big data and artificial intelligence to objectively analyze green assets and brown assets.
"From 2018 to 2021, we rated MSCI’s A-share companies. Among the targets of these evaluations, the rating rose by 16.2%, while the rating fell by only 6.2%. Obviously, it can be seen that the progress in recent years is very fast, indicating that the entire ecosystem is paying more and more attention. " Huang Fan, executive director of morgan stanley capital international, an international index compilation company, and director of China index business, MSCI at the summit.
So, what are the obstacles to ESG development? Huang Fan said that at present, the main orientation of domestic investors is to pursue short-term good track. The scale of ESG assets is relatively small, and investors need a process of acceptance and confirmation for the three topics of ESG as a whole and the benefits that ESG will eventually bring to them. Although it is still in the initial stage, this trend is irreversible in the foreseeable future.
Wu Bin, the founding partner and president of Zhongping Capital, said, "The biggest goal of green finance is to solve the externality of market failure through new financial means. From the point of view I have observed, our market competition is very full and fierce. In many traditional industries, the gross profit margin may be single digits. For them, survival is in the first place. "