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From natural carbon dioxide refrigeration at ice rinks to 100 percent renewables-powered venues, China is striving to run a “green” Olympics to showcase its leadership in climate-friendly tech. President Xi Jinping has pledged China will reduce its total carbon emissions from 2030 and be a global leader in fighting climate change.
“(The Chinese) want sustainability to be the heart of how they prepare and host the Games,” Marie Sallois, Director of Corporate and Sustainable Development at the International Olympics Committee, told Reuters. The Beijing Winter Olympics Committee said in a pre-Games report in January that about 158,300 tons of emissions have been saved via deployment of low-carbon energy and venues. Total greenhouses gases emissions could reach 1.028 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent throughout the preparation and post-Beijing Games in 2016-2022, about a third less than the 1.6 million tons emitted for South Korea’s Pyeongchang Games in 2018. Most of that reduction comes from the absence of overseas spectators at the Beijing Games. The lower number of international flights will mean 512,000 tons of CO2 emissions less than earlier projections, the committee said.
Waste cooled rinks
China, for the first time at an Olympics, is using CO2 collected from industrial waste gases to cool ice rinks in its four ice sports venues, replacing traditional hydrofluorocarbons that can damage the ozone layer. “With the CO2 refrigeration process, we can save 20-30 percent on electricity compared to traditional ice making methods,” Wu Xiaonan, an official at the National Speed Skating Oval, said earlier this week. The 25 games venues, of which 13 were newly built, have also deployed energy-saving technologies, including low-carbon building materials such as recycled cement and smart snowmaking, which could use 20 percent less water than traditional technologies.
All Games venues will also be fully powered by electricity from wind farms in the neighboring Hebei Province through a 666-km ultra-high voltage grid, while more than 800 hydrogen-fueled vehicles are being deployed.
China is the world’s largest hydrogen producer, with annual production capacity of 41 million tons, and has been striving to make technology breakthroughs in storage and transporting the clean energy.