The Asia Research Centre has recently been remodeled with a wider focus for activities. This broader view embraces research areas across Murdoch University. Activities have been split under two coordinators: Gitte Heij managing consultancy, and Ian Scott heading research.

Murdoch researchers at the Asia Research Centre (ARC) recently commenced a landmark joint study with the Energy Research Institute (ERI) in Beijing, examining ways that energy policy in China might be affected by political, social and broader economic developments.

According to Gitte Heij, project manager at the ARC, China is an economy in transition, with greater consideration being given to energy policy. Until now, coal has provided 75 per cent of energy, but gas is becoming more important due to its clean burning and convenience.

In March 1999 the ERI, which is affiliated with China’s State Development Planning Commission, called for a sharp break from the self-sufficient, coal dependent energy posture of the past five decades. The report argued that China must halve its dependence on coal over the next fifty years, while sharply boosting natural gas production and oil and importing liquefied natural gas (LNG).

China is about to embark on a pilot project importing LNG, into Guangdong Province in southern China. Although there are problems with gas – it is not as easy to transport and store as coal and it requires greater investment in distribution facilities – it will assist China in meeting eventual climate change treaty commitments. These goals cannot be reached with current dependence on coal.

Ms Gitte Heij explained that there was a significant difference in policy and requirements of the provincial and central governments in China.

To date a number of studies have been conducted on the technical and commercial issues relating to China’s use of natural gas and LNG. However, the ARC’s investigation is taking a different perspective, analysing the relative influence of different areas of central government on the development and direction of national energy policy, particularly in relation to natural gas.

“Many people are working in the coal industry, so the transition from coal mining to importing gas will have social costs in the provinces,” she said.

“At an international level, the world is watching whether imports of natural gas will change China’s current attitude towards the World Trade Organisation.”

Ms Heij and China specialist Dr Sally Sargeson from the ARC visited the ERI in July, and a team of social scientists and economists will begin fieldwork in September. ERI researchers will have a reciprocal visit to Murdoch University and Canberra later this year, studying the Australian gas market and policy framework and meeting with industry and government bodies. Several academics in the School of Economics and in the Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Renewable Energy will be involved in this visit.

“The primary goal of this investigation is to provide Australia with an independent policy analysis of the energy market in China,” said Ms Heij.

“It will offer an insight into possible scenarios for China’s energy sector in the medium term, and of the implications of China’s increasing use of natural gas.”

The research commenced in June and it is expected that the final report will be published in January 2001. Australia LNG, Woodside Energy, the Australian Department of Industry, Science and Resources, the WA Department of Resources Development, and the Northern Territory Office of Resource Development are funding the project.