Greened Games

Sustainable development was one of the three main concepts underpinning Beijing's bid to host the 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, and the Low-Carbon Management of the Beijing 2022 Games (Pre-Games) Report released by the Beijing Winter Olympic Committee in January details the measures adopted to minimize the carbon emissions generated by the Games.

The greenhouse gas accounting for the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics will cover the period from Jan 1, 2016 to June 30,2022, the longest time span of any Olympic Games, as the accounting will cover the three phases of pre-Games preparation, Games operation and post-Games dismantling.

Two of the most eye-catching measures are the use of 100 percent renewable energy to power the venues and the large-scale application of clean-energy vehicles.

From the time preparations began in 2019 to the end of the Games, it is expected that the Games' venues will have consumed 400 million kilowatt-hours of electricity in total. In order to achieve the goal of being the first Winter Olympic Games to use 100 percent green power for all venues, the organizers of the Games have adopted two specific measures. The Zhangbei renewable energy flexible direct current power grid test project in Zhangjiakou, Hebei province, has delivered green power to the competition and non-competition venues, allowing all venue of the Beijing 2022 Games to purchase green power by means of a trans-regional renewable energy trading mechanism.

Zhangjiakou is rich in wind and solar energy resources, with an installed capacity of 16 gigawatts of wind power generation and 7 GW of solar power generation. The Zhangbei renewable energy flexible direct current power grid test project utilizes the complementary nature of various forms of energy, including wind power, photovoltaic power and energy storage, to overcome the intermittent and unstable nature of renewable energy generation. It is expected to deliver approximately 14.1 billion kWh of renewable energy generated in Zhangjiakou to Beijing each year. In addition, 11 wind and solar power generation companies located in Zhangjiakou are the main suppliers to the renewable energy trading market.

With the aim of maximizing the use of clean energy vehicles, the transportation within the Beijing competition zone has mainly relied on pure electric and natural-gas-fueled vehicles, while hydrogen fuel cell vehicles have been used in the Yanqing and Zhangjiakou zones. During the Games, 816 hydrogen-based vehicles and 370 battery electric vehicles have been used, combined accounting for 29 percent of the total of 4,090 service vehicles.

Although hydrogen fuel cell vehicles emit only water while driving, if the hydrogen is produced from fossil energy sources, it is not a low-emission energy source throughout its life cycle. Companies responsible for securing the supply of hydrogen for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles use green electricity generated from renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power to produce hydrogen.

In addition, Shell's 20-megawatt zero-carbon hydrogen project in Zhangjiakou has also provided half of the total green hydrogen supply for fuel cell vehicles at the Zhangjiakou competition zone by decomposing water molecules with electricity from onshore wind power. After the Winter Games, the hydrogen produced will also be used for public and commercial transportation in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.

On Jan 13, Li Sen, director of the General Planning Department of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, declared that the Beijing Winter Olympics will be fully carbon neutral at a news conference at the State Council Information Office. The Winter Olympics has become an important testing ground for China to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.

Carbon offsetting measures, such as forestry carbon sinks, China Certified Emission Reduction/CERs sponsorship by Games-related enterprises, are implemented. Since the start of the Beijing Winter Olympics bid, afforestation projects have been identified as a major measure of carbon offsetting. Beijing and Zhangjiakou have completed afforestation projects spread across 47,333 hectares and 33,000 hectares respectively, and the carbon sequestration verified by the third-party will be fully used for carbon offsetting for the Games. In addition, three of the official sponsors of the Beijing Winter Olympics－PetroChina, the China Three Gorges Corp and the State Grid Corp－have provided a certain amount of CCERs/CERs to the Beijing Organizing Committee.

The author is an assistant researcher at the Rock Environment and Energy Institute. The author contributed this article to China Watch, a think tank powered by China Daily. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

Contact the editor at editor@chinawatch.cn