Beginning in Spring 2017, the China Project is publishing a newsletter at the end of every academic semester, recounting our recent activities and latest research developments, as well as previewing some of our upcoming activities. The newsletters are available in both English and Chinese and in various printed and electronic forms. Click on the links below to download the Spring 2017 edition. Read more about China Project Spring 2017 Newsletter

Project Economist Mun HO and Executive Director Chris NIELSEN have an op-ed in Fortune (and in Chinese at Fortune China) on the underappreciated reasons China's red alert air pollution episodes are proving so difficult to control. Factors range from atmospheric chemistry and meteorology to economics and

Project Chair Prof. Michael MCELROY and several other Harvard faculty weighed in on the implications that a Trump administration poses for climate change in a recent Harvard Gazette article. 

Prof. McElroy noted that even if the U.S. cedes leadership in climate impact and clean energy technology, “China most likely will continue to reduce its emissions regardless…because Chinese action is driven in part by rampant air pollution that the nation’s leadership has committed to address. The solutions there

Project Chair Prof. Michael MCELROY was interviewed by Harvard Gazette about his most recent book, Energy and Climate: Vision for the Future, published in August by Oxford University Press. In the book, McElroy provides a comprehensive introduction to issues of energy systems and climate change, with a specific focus on the U.S. and China.

Read more about McElroy on New Book "Energy and Climate: Vision for the Future"

Prof. Dale JORGENSON and Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN are quoted in the China Daily USA about China’s plans to implement national emissions trading, primarily targeting heavy industries, and the potential role of taxes to meet China’s carbon pricing goals in other economic sectors.  Read more about China Daily Quotes Jorgenson and Nielsen on Carbon Pricing

Prof. Dale JORGENSON was interviewed by Caixin, China's independent news magazine, and he and Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN were interviewed by the Harvard Gazette, about the role of taxes to meet China's carbon pricing goals given limitations

A China Project study led by Prof. LU Xi (now at Tsinghua U.) and Project Chair Prof. Michael McELROY, comparing the challenges of wind power development in China and the U.S., is the cover article of Nature Energy. The paper decomposes factors contributing to wind power underperformance, including curtailment, differences in turbine quality, and delayed grid connection.  Read more about Lu et al. Wind Power Study on the Cover of Nature Energy

An interdisciplinary household survey in Chengdu, led by China Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN, Prof. James HAMMITT (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health), and Profs. SHEN Mingming and YAN Jie (School of Government, Peking University), was completed in July and data files are now being prepared. Read more about Household Survey of Travel Behavior and Environmental Health Risk in Chengdu

Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN is quoted in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives regarding satellite-based evidence that annual average PM2.5 concentrations have declined throughout most of China since 2007, contrary to widespread popular perceptions. 

Nielsen comments that the new findings from the study, led by colleagues MA Zongwei and LIU Yang of Emory University, are consistent with effects of various factors on air quality, and

China Project economist Mun HO contrasts economic conditions in China's rust belt to that of other regions and the resulting effects on local environmental implementation. For an audio excerpt of the interview on the BBC's "The Inquiry," click here. Ho describes the challenges of unexpected economic slowdown within China and the prolonged global

Harvard President Drew FAUST announced the selection of the China Project to receive the first anchor grant of the newly established Harvard Global Institute. This major award, at $1.25 M annually for 3 years with an option for renewal, will support

Prof. Mike McElroy, Project Chair, is interviewed in the Harvard Gazette about China’s latest climate commitment, how the latest U.S.-China announcement might affect the UN climate talks in Paris, and whether it might make U.S. officials more open to a national plan to curb carbon emissions. McElroy specifically addresses the Chinese plans to enact national carbon trading and to commit $3.1B in climate-related

Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN is quoted in the New York Times questioning the permanence of any short-term peak of coal use in China, and emphasizing the dependence of China's carbon trajectory on the course of its slowing economy and policy responses.

In VICE News 

The meeting of Presidents XI Jinping and Drew FAUST and the speech at Tsinghua University both emphasized the challenges of combating global climate change and the role of U.S.-Chinese partnerships, citing the Harvard

The China Project has been awarded a grant from Harvard President Drew Faust's Climate Change Solutions Fund. The awarded study integrates research led by faculty in four Harvard schools, collaborating with counterparts at three

An article in Harvard Magazine describes research by Dale JORGENSON, University Professor of Economics, and colleagues on the potential economic and environmental benefits of taxing carbon in both the U.S. and China, including work in the China Project reported in Clearer Skies Over China.  Read more about Jorgenson on Carbon Taxes in the U.S. and China

Changing regional climate might be increasing atmospheric stagnation in northern China in winter, contributing to recent severe haze episodes. This is an area of active investigation in the atmospheric science community, both within China and beyond. It was one topic explored at a Harvard China Project symposium, "China 2035: Energy, Climate, and Development," held June 18-19 at the Harvard Center Shanghai with leading Chinese scientists, economists, and policy analysts. Read more about New York Times Cites China Project Symposium and Investigation