War on Pollution 

In APES class this spring term, we were assigned on April fourth 2023 to look at different mitigations or adaptations that different city/state has against greenhouse gases. I personally picked my hometown ShenZhen to do the research on. Here is some pciture of my beautiful home town ShenZhen.

According to National Standards of People's Republic of China, "Until 2018 China has been the biggest single carbon dioxide emissions country in the world, in total, we emitted over 102 ton of carbon dioxide" (National Standards of People's Republic of China, 2018, Chapter 34).

https://www.sichengtech.com/3310.html

After all the bad news, what has Shenzhen done to control and regulate Carbon Dioxide emissions? According to the thirty-fifth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Sixth Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress held On October 30, 2012, Shenzhen has passed nine laws about carbon dioxide emissions. There are three major laws. The first one is "Implementation of a carbon emission control system is needed. The carbon emissions of essential carbon emitting enterprises and other key carbon emitting units (hereinafter referred to as "carbon emission control units") within the Special Zones of Shenzhen shall be controlled, and the carbon emission control units shall fulfill their responsibilities. Carbon emission units not included in the carbon emission control system will be encouraged to join the system voluntarily" (Thirty-fifth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Sixth Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, Chapter One).

Shenzhen's government officials created a system that will monitor the carbon emissions of different companies. They all have a different limit if they exceed the limit, as the second law states: "Where a carbon emission control unit, in violation of these Provisions, discharges carbon in excess of its emission quota, the competent municipal department of carbon emission rights trading shall impose a fine based on the standard of three times the average market price of carbon emission in violation." So it can help to control the emission of carbon gases. (Thirty-fifth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Sixth Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, Chapter Two)

The third law is," The government of Shenzhen will support and encourage companies or individuals to participate in carbon emission trading in Shenzhen, and the municipal people's government should strengthen its leadership over the control of carbon emissions and provide support and guarantee in terms of policies, funds, and technology." (Thirty-fifth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Sixth Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, Chapter Three)

(https://baike.baidu.com/item/深圳经济特区碳排放管理若干规定/18568591#1)

  In 2018, Shenzhen became the first-ever major city in the plant to have 100% electric-powered buses. All public transportation bus is run on electricity. This led to a decrease in CO2 emissions by 61%, energy saving up to 72.9%, which is equivalent to 360 thousand yuan, and most importantly, saved 345 thousand tons of diesel every year compared to the old-fashioned diesel buses. Almost 2.8 million ton of CO2 is reduced from the atmosphere each year just by switching to electric buses. Not to mention that Shenzhen switched all public transportation to the electric version. Buses, subways, taxis, and even Ubers are all electric now (Shenzhen Bus Group Co. LTD).

(Data provided by Shenzhen Bus Group Co. LTD)

The question now is how Shenzhen can manage to do that. In the simplest term, we have money and resources. In 2015, the government of the People's Republic of China started to give money to the local government of Shenzhen to build electric cars and buses and all the necessary related things. In 2018, Shenzhen had over 8000 chargers for buses and cars. So people have fewer worries about access to chargers. Shenzhen is also the headquarter for BYD Auto, which is single handedly the biggest electronic automobiles companies in China. It is like the Chinese version of Tesla. This makes the building and shipping of automobiles simple. They can build it in Shenzhen and sell it right away. It reduced the cause and risk of shipping the car. According to Zeng Hao, Director of the Taxi Passenger Transport Division, Shenzhen Municipal Public Transport Administration, " Taking 2018 as an example, the Shenzhen Municipal Transportation Commission awarded 44 taxi companies a total of 8,257 electric taxis, giving each vehicle a one-time excess emission reduction reward of 164,800 yuan, totaling 1.361 billion yuan. This directly makes up for enterprises' economic losses caused by new energy replacement to a certain extent"(Zeng, 2020) 

（https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=17160751280311209440&wfr=spider&for=pc）

（https://www.didi-group.com/case-item-185.html）

（https://www.yoojia.com/article/2727054348418877324.html）

（https://hxny.com/nd-40147-0-17.html）

It is fascinating to learn about all the regulations and policies that Shenzhen has to control the emissions of CO2 and what we have accomplished so far. Like the rule, each company will have a certain amount of CO2 emission limit, and excess on the limit can be fined three times the price of CO2 emission credit. Furthermore, we are reducing emissions by changing public transportation to electronic automobiles. Only on buses, we reduced around 2.8 million tons of CO2 emissions. Of course, there are different policies and regulations around China. However, with the fabulous regulation and policies we have in Shenzhen, I am looking forward to more changes and further reducing greenhouse gas emissions so that we, as the younger generations, can enjoy the beauty of Mother Earth.

Shenzhen is a fantastic place, it is one of the most developed cities in the world, and it has beautiful weather, hot sometimes but still beautiful. It is very convenient because public transportation can take you to every corner of Shenzhen. It has some of the country's best food and is a very inclusive city. Shenzhen people are very hospitable. Please visit Shenzhen; it is where I grew up and where my heart will be.

（All photo created/ found by Zack Cong unless otherwise stated.）

（Photo produced by Keyun Deng, found by Zack Cong）

http://www.sz.gov.cn/cn/xxgk/zfxxgj/bmdt/content/post_9370171.html