Zhenjiang, Jiangsu: The "carbon" road transformation is symbiotic and win-win, and it stimulates new momentum for green development

On October 26, the 2023 Jinshan Summit on Carbon Peak and Carbon Neutrality was held in Zhenjiang. The theme of this summit is "Green Transformation, Low-carbon Development - Strengthening the Industrial Chain and Gathering Supply Chains" to jointly promote green and low-carbon high-quality development. During the conference, focusing on the promotion of "dual carbon", eight major actions for carbon peak and carbon neutrality were launched, and an action plan for low-carbon life was released, focusing on strengthening the chain and gathering chains, promoting the realization of product technical cooperation, releasing 124 product technology requirements, and reaching a cooperation contract of 67.87 billion yuan, focusing on financial empowerment, organizing green finance docking activities, and releasing the fourth batch of 220 "white lists" of 220 financial assistance enterprises, and reaching a credit of 8.55 billion yuan on the spot.

The confluence of rivers and the beads of the three mountains, the unique endowment of mountains and rivers make the "blood" of Zhenjiang full of "green genes". In November 2012, Zhenjiang was included in the second batch of low-carbon pilot cities in China, and in June 2014, it was listed as the first batch of pilot demonstration areas for ecological civilization construction in China. Keeping in mind General Secretary Xi Jinping's earnest message to "Zhenjiang is very promising", the Zhenjiang Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government have seriously implemented the requirements of green and low-carbon development, explored low-carbon, green and ecological development models along the way, and enriched the "Chinese plan" for global climate governance with Zhenjiang's practice.

"Towards the new journey of Chinese-style modernization, Zhenjiang will resolutely establish the concept of 'lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets', put ecological priority, green and low-carbon development road wider and wider, and contribute Zhenjiang's strength to the province's 'leading in promoting the harmonious coexistence of man and nature'. Ma Minglong, secretary of the Zhenjiang Municipal Party Committee, said that as a national low-carbon city pilot excellent city, Zhenjiang aims at the direction of "four groups and eight chains" leading industries, promotes the reshaping of the advantages of industrial chain groups such as digital economy, life and health, new materials, and high-end equipment manufacturing, continues to promote ecological improvement, and promotes the green and low-carbon transformation of the economy and society for a long time.

The industry is green, and it is striving to break the waves and sail hard

"With a total investment of 6 billion yuan, the vinyl acetate and EVA project is being stepped up, and after completion, acetic acid can be processed into vinyl acetate and EVA resin, especially the photovoltaic grade EVA resin with a content of 28%, which not only meets the requirements of the national clean energy policy and 'double carbon' work, but also has a good market prospect. Hu Zonggui, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Thorpe Group, said that as a local veteran chemical state-owned enterprise, Thorpe Group controls the total use of carbon from the source, and adopts advanced green production technology to transform production equipment and innovate carbon sources, and continues to explore green and low-carbon transformation paths. At present, the two new technologies that the company and Nanjing University have cooperated with are both green technologies, both of which will play a role in reducing consumption.

The Fourth Plenary Session of the Eighth Zhenjiang Municipal Party Committee took "more harmonious modernization between man and nature" as one of the "six more" modernization pictures, and Zhenjiang actively coordinated the "four pairs" of development and emission reduction, overall and partial, long-term and short-term goals, and government and market, practiced the "1+N" policy system of carbon peak and carbon neutrality, resolutely fought the key battle of "double carbon" landing, and made every effort to build a beautiful Zhenjiang, so that ecological priority, conservation and intensification, and green and low-carbon became a vivid footnote to high-quality development.

The city's GDP increased by 90.7%, energy consumption per unit of GDP decreased by 37.7%, carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP decreased by 50.4%, the annual average concentration of PM2.5 decreased by 50.3%, and the ratio of good days increased by 19.8 percentage points...... In the past ten years of the low-carbon pilot project, Zhenjiang's total economic output has crossed three hundred billion yuan steps, while the emission of major pollutants has decreased year by year, and the development content is more sufficient, the green content is higher, and the carbon content is lower, and Zhenjiang has also achieved the "three synchronizations" of high-quality economic development, continuous environmental optimization and significant reduction of carbon emission intensity.

"Focus on the development of green and low-carbon industries and clean energy application industries, promote the strategic adjustment of energy structure and industrial structure, promote the comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development, and make green and low-carbon the background color of high-quality development. Xu Shuhai, mayor of Zhenjiang City, introduced that Zhenjiang will focus on cultivating "four groups and eight chains" of "four groups and eight chains" with high green content, high technology content and high gold content, and eliminate backward production capacity. Zhenjiang has taken down-to-earth actions to promote the optimization and adjustment of industrial structure, energy structure, and transportation structure step by step, and has drawn a strong stroke for the green development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt.

This year, with energy conservation and carbon reduction and green transformation as the traction, Zhenjiang launched the implementation of the special action of "intelligent transformation and digital transformation" and the green manufacturing promotion action, and implemented 229 green transformation projects. At the same time, Zhenjiang took the lead in initiating the identification of municipal-level green factories among prefecture-level cities in the country, and has cultivated a total of 17 national-level green factories, 24 provincial-level factories and 115 municipal-level factories. In the past ten years, Zhenjiang has won 1 first prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award, 3 second prizes of the National Science and Technology Progress Award (Technological Invention) and 53 Jiangsu Science and Technology Awards in the field of low-carbon technology.

Pursue the dream of green energy and ignite a new engine for development

On November 1, the State Grid Jiangsu Jurong Pumped Storage Power Station transmission project completed the acceptance. As a major infrastructure project in the province, the Jurong Pumped Storage Power Station project with a total investment of 9.6 billion yuan plans to install six 225,000 kilowatt reversible hydro-generator units, with an installed capacity of 1.35 million kilowatts, and it is expected that the first unit will be put into operation by the end of 2024, and all units will be put into operation for power generation in 2025. At present, the project has completed the storage of about 3.75 million cubic meters of water, which can reduce coal consumption by about 140,000 tons per year, reduce carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide emissions by about 357,000 tons, and directly create profits and taxes of about 250 million yuan per year.

Adjusting and optimizing the economic structure is the key to promoting the green transformation of the development mode at the source, and it is necessary to accelerate the pace of greening and low-carbon in key areas such as industry, energy, and transportation. Zhenjiang is steadily taking the road of new industrialization, coordinating hydropower development and ecological protection, accelerating the construction of distributed photovoltaic projects and Zhenjiang pumped storage power station demonstration clusters, continuously optimizing the energy supply structure, giving full play to the advantages of the intersection of hot metal channels, creating a more competitive multimodal transport system, accelerating the formation of an industrial structure, production mode and spatial pattern that conserve resources and protect the environment, and help the new road to surpass with the "double carbon" reform, so that green and low-carbon will become the significant feature and competitive advantage of modern Zhenjiang.

"Actively build a green, low-carbon and circular development economic system, and vigorously cultivate new momentum for green and low-carbon industries. Qin Haitao, member of the Standing Committee of the Zhenjiang Municipal Party Committee and executive vice mayor, said that Zhenjiang is accelerating the integrated development of "new energy + energy storage", and taking energy storage as an important support for the development of green electricity.

In the past ten years, Zhenjiang City has carried out in-depth ultra-low emission transformation of coal-fired power plants, with a total of 1 million kilowatts of transformation, and achieved a significant reduction in the emission of pollutants such as sulfur dioxide in three coal-fired power plants in the town; actively developed clean and renewable energy such as wind power, photovoltaic and biomass power generation; built a cluster of pumped storage power stations, and built four pumped storage power station projects under construction or included in the planning layout, including Jurong Lunshan Lake, Jurong Shidangshan, Weigang Qingshan Lake and Weigang Yongxing Dam, with a total installed capacity of 5.15 million kilowatts.

Vigorously promote the "three reforms" of coal-fired power energy-saving and consumption-reducing transformation, flexibility transformation and heating transformation, and build the largest single-unit gas-fired generating unit in the province, increase the proportion of clean energy consumption, take the lead in the province's rooftop distributed photovoltaic development, and establish Zhenjiang Low-carbon Industrial Technology Research Institute to promote low-carbon, zero-carbon, and carbon-negative technology research and development and demonstration ...... Zhenjiang has organized the implementation of the "Eight Actions of Carbon Peaking and Carbon Neutrality" such as green and low-carbon transformation of industries, green and low-carbon energy transformation, green and low-carbon technological innovation, and improvement of energy conservation and efficiency improvement, and continues to take the road of integration and win-win integration of environmental protection and economic development.

Ten years of "carbon" road, thousands of sails competing. A series of innovative measures have been launched, a series of institutional arrangements have been released, and a series of exploration and practice have been implemented.

Symbiosis and win-win, playing a "concerted song" for the protection of the Yangtze River

On November 11, the 2023 Zhenjiang Yangtze River Finless Porpoise Conservation Theme Month with the theme of "Science and Technology Helps Finless Porpoise Conservation" was launched in Xijindu Jianyuan Square. From "uncommon" to "often seen", the protection of the Yangtze finless porpoise in Zhenjiang has achieved remarkable results. According to the results of the just-concluded ecological scientific investigation of the Zhenjiang Yangtze River Porpoise Provincial Nature Reserve, there are 946 species of wild animals and plants in the reserve, including 4 species of wild animals under national first-class key protection (Yangtze finless porpoise, white crane, Oriental white stork, Baer's Pochard), and 37 species of wild animals and plants under national second-class key protection.

Zhenjiang, named after the Yangtze River, built by the Yangtze River and prospered by the Yangtze River, is an important node of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, shouldering the important task of protecting the ecological barrier of the Yangtze River. In recent years, Zhenjiang City has firmly grasped the strategic orientation of "jointly grasping large-scale protection and not engaging in large-scale development", and sang the song of the Yangtze River in the new era. In the Zhenjiang Yangtze River Porpoise Provincial Nature Reserve, the "Smiling Angel" finless porpoise's "visibility" is getting higher and higher, becoming a shining business card of ecological Zhenjiang.

The number of finless porpoises has increased rapidly, the overall water quality has remained normalized and excellent, and the wetlands and afforestation along the Yangtze River have undergone great changes, which has also benefited the people of Zhenjiang even more. Zhenjiang has renovated the shoreline of the Yangtze River with the vigor of grasping iron marks, carried out in-depth implementation of retirement and beach restoration, demolished 260,000 square meters of buildings, vacated 28 kilometers of shoreline, restored 20,000 mu of tidal wetland ecology in tributaries of the Yangtze River, and protected the Yangtze River wetland area of 28,125 hectares. Afforestation and greening on both sides of the Zhenjiang section of the Yangtze River have been further promoted, and an ecological scenery belt has been initially formed based on the Yangtze River ecological landscape shelterbelt and characterized by Shiye Ecological Continent, Jiaobeitan Wetland, Jiangxin Ecological Continent, Gaoqiao Green Bank and Yangzhong Ecological Island.

"Zhenjiang has 293.8 kilometers of Yangtze River shoreline, ranking second among the eight cities along the Yangtze River in the province, and has a great responsibility to protect the ecological barrier of the Yangtze River. Tan Qinlei, Secretary of the Party Group and Director of the Zhenjiang Development and Reform Commission, introduced that in recent years, Zhenjiang has fully implemented the "Yangtze River Protection Law", put the restoration of the Yangtze River ecological environment in an overwhelming position, strengthened the tracing of the root cause, systematic treatment, and promoted the transformation of the Yangtze River protection from passive management at the end to active governance at the source. Research and formulate a series of documents such as the "Key Points of Zhenjiang City's Annual Work for Promoting the High-quality Development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt" and the "List of Problems and Improvement Work Plan for Zhenjiang City to Comprehensively Promote the Development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt", and coordinate the promotion of the "4+1" project of pollution control. Pay close attention to the rectification of outstanding problems in the ecological environment of the Yangtze River, give full play to the overall coordination role of the Yangtze River Office, coordinate and link all relevant departments in various localities, and fight the battle of ecological protection and restoration of the Yangtze River with high quality.

The Zhenjiang Yangtze River Shoreline Resources Protection Regulations, the country's first local regulation on the protection of Yangtze River shoreline resources, were promulgated to promote the protection of the Yangtze River ecological environment and the optimal allocation of resources; the first local finless porpoise conservation alliance in the country, the Zhenjiang Yangtze River Finless Porpoise Conservation Alliance, was established, with 16 member units jointly guarding the "Elves in the River", and 11 river-related units formed the "Jiang Dun" Party Building Alliance to jointly play the "Yangtze River Protection" synergy...... This year, Zhenjiang issued the "Zhenjiang Yangtze River Shoreline Protection Special Action Work Plan", focusing on the protection of the Yangtze River shoreline, and carrying out large-scale investigation and rectification in the city. Of the 270 illegal projects along the Yangtze River, 265 have been rectified so far, and the rectification of the remaining problems will be completed by the end of the year.