Small Hydropower in China with Dr. Tyler Harlan

加州大学洛杉矶分校的泰勒·哈伦博士讲座“中国绿色经济发展模式探索”

2017年11月1日，来自加州大学洛杉矶分校的泰勒·哈伦博士与清华-霍普金斯项目学者进行了亲切地面对面交流，本次讲座也是双硕士项目“中国政治与经济”案例课程的第三堂课。哈伦博士以“中国的小水电是否能成为跨国绿色发展模式”为题进行了主旨演讲，他试图挑战“中国能源发展只有一种模式”的传统观点，并尝试纠正“中国依赖非清洁能源和破坏环境维持经济高速发展”的这一错误观念。

Dr. Harlan began by highlighting that China is the world leader in small hydropower plants, with 47,000 plants currently in use after having first utilized the renewable resource in 1911. The prevalence of this technology within the country is the result of its ability to both provide off-the-grid energy and cut down on the need for deforestation, favorable traits that led to their historical deployment primarily as a means of energy and revenue for poorer provinces with low levels of industrialization. China’s unique demographic needs also led to differentiating characteristics in its standardization of hydropower, often defining a 50-megawatt (MW) hydropower source as small, compared to most countries’ 10 MW.

Unfortunately, these benefits can come at the cost of river ecosystems, which are disrupted with the requisite damming needed for the structures to function. Additionally, energy production can be limited by the weather patterns of specific seasons, leading many Chinese small hydropower dams to effectively shut down during dry spells. This particular shortcoming can prove to be enough of a problem that Dr. Harlan recounted hearing a provincial official in Yunnan, a region with a high number of small hydropower plants, refer to small hydropower as “garbage electricity”. As a result, China has sharply ceased in approving new small hydropower sources during the past decade, particularly as the previously dependent southwestern regions have developed.

Dr. Harlan also noted that wind and solar are generally seen as newer and “sexier” technologies when compared to small hydropower, thereby increasingly receiving vastly more attention in recent years from the Chinese government. This is trend away from small hydropower is true abroad as well – among developed states, only Turkey, Western Canada, and the former Yugoslavia are hotbeds of small hydropower today. The vast differences in renewable energy implementation across Chinese provinces and municipalities highlights a central problem in analyzing Chinese environmental policy – the variation in practices and model-making.

Following on this note, Dr. Harlan argued that rather than a single unifying “China model” of environmental governance, there are in fact many smaller China models which other states may look to on a case-by-case basis. While there are still few studies on the models of green development in China, despite their growing prevalence, Harlan contended that there was little evidence of a Beijing-directed grand strategy in green energy development. Instead, research suggests that local and provincial governments, as well as non-state actors, implement policy, with wide-ranging methods and results. To this end, small hydropower in China is primarily financed by both government and government aligned institutions such as the Hangzhou Regional Center for Small Hydro Power (HRC) and the International Center on Small Hydro Power (ICSHP), which also operate abroad through either direct aid, sale, or support from Chinese investors.

In terms of international development, while the Chinese government has made a strong pivot towards investments in green development in the past decade, they do not pressure other countries to follow suit. This is particularly notable given that Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) has increased to 135 billion USD in 2017, up from 10 billion USD only ten years ago. While green model-making is confined to China’s domestic sphere, aid and investment can also be a space of transnational model-making. Other countries that heavily rely on small hydropower include India, Nepal, Turkey, Croatia, and Montenegro. However, since current transnational model-making lacks a firm connection to politics, it is of limited use; aid and investment always have a geopolitical purpose. Small hydropower is not a universal panacea and can therefore only be evaluated on a country-to-country basis.

With a focus on hydropower, solar, and wind energy, Dr. Harlan asserted that self-reliance, flexible policy-making, and a strong central government and management system, are all essential for other states to develop a firm green development strategy. Simultaneously, the critical challenge to finding success lies in the balance between attracting profits via FDI and helping the local community and ecosystem prosper.

首先，哈伦博士强调了中国在世界小水电发展的领导地位。目前，中国已建有47000多座运行中的小水电站。小水电之所以能在中国迅速发展，得益于它自身的两个优势。一方面，它是离网发电，规模较小，易于管理；另一方面，它能减少人们对森林的砍伐，是一种环保的发电方式。因此，小水电在中国曾被视为地方政府提供能源和财政收入的极优方案，尤其是在工业较不发达的地区。此外，由于中国人口众多，能源需求量大，导致中国对于水电站规模的划分标准与其它国家有所不同，一般来说，其他国家将小水电站定义为10兆瓦及以下的发电容量，而中国的标准则是50兆瓦及以下。这种标准上的差异使得中国小水电站数量在统计上存在一定的泡沫。

不可否认的是，小水电也存在一定的弱势。首先，建造小水电站需要在河流中央修建必要的基础设施，在一定程度上，这样的行为对当地河流生态系统有所破坏。其次，小水电的产能受到不同季节和天气情况的制约：由于旱季河流流量严重下降，水电产成本收益比非常不乐观，许多小水电站不得不因此关停。该问题在实际情况下非常严峻。以云南为例，云南是一个建有相当数量的小水电站的省份，尽管如此，一位来自当地的省政府的官员仍然将小水电站视为“垃圾产能”的一种。因此，之前严重依赖小水电的西南地区到现如今已经基本发展成型，能源需求基本能够满足，小水电发展的必要性相应就减弱了，中国政府已经开始大规模裁减小水电站的批设。

哈伦博士还提到，和小水电相比，风能和太阳能渐渐被视为更加新颖和物美价廉的技术，近年来得到越来越多中国政府的关注。这是一种全球能源发展的趋势，在发达国家特为尤甚。目前，小水电只在土耳其、加拿大西部以及前捷克斯洛伐克等少数地区得到长足发展。在中国，地区不同，所选择的可再生能源种类也大有不同。这种巨大的差别导致了分析中国环境政策过程的一个重大困难——具体实践和模式制定中的不一致性。

为此，哈伦博士认为，中国的环境监管无法简单地被定义为一个“中国模式”。事实上，中国存在很多零散的、小规模的发展模式，这些模式都非常值得一一进行研究。尽管当前中国的绿色发展如日中天，对中国绿色发展模式的探索却仍然停留在很初级的阶段。几乎没有证据能说明当前中国政府提出了一个主导绿色发展的“大战略”。相反，研究表明，地方和基层以及非政府组织在面对绿色发展时，各自采用不同方法来落实政策，并且落实的结果也大相径庭。正因如此，中国的小水电站主要同时由政府和与政府有合作关系的相关机构推动，例如杭州小水电区域发展中心【Hangzhou Regional Center for Small Hydro Power (HRC)】以及国际小水电发展中心【the International Center on Small Hydro Power (ICSHP)】，它们主要是通过直接援助和中国企业投资来实现融资的。

从国际发展的角度上看，尽管中国政府在过去的十年中强有力地推动了绿色发展中的投资，却没有办法向其他国家施加压力迫使他们效法中国的实践。考虑到中国对外直接投资从十年前的100亿美元猛增至2017年的1350亿美元，这个反差就显得格外突出。尽管绿色发展模式的探索被局限在了中国国内，但援助和投资仍然可以成为跨国模式探索的一个突破口：比如印度、尼泊尔、土耳其、克罗地亚和黑山就相当依赖小水电的发展。中国输出小水电发展模式尚有较大空间。然而，目前跨国模式的探索和推广缺乏一个有政治影响力的企业来牵头，这局限了该模式发挥作用；而援助和投资也常常服务于地缘政治的需要。小水电不是一个全球范围内的万灵药，它的作用只能以国家作为单位来考察。

经过长期对水电、太阳能和风能的研究，哈伦博士认为，对于任何一个想制定切实可行的绿色发展战略的国家来说，能源上的充分自给、灵活的政府决策和强有力的中央调控，这三者缺一不可，而最大的挑战则在于通过外国直接投资追求利润与维护当地生态保护之间的矛盾。