China has experienced tremendous growth in the production and sales of room air conditioners over the last decade. Although minimum room air conditioner energy efficiency standards have been in effect since 1989, no efforts were made during most of the 1990's to update the standard to be more reflective of current market conditions. In 1999, China's State Bureau of Technical Supervision (SBTS) included in their annual plan the development and revision of the 1989 room air conditioner standard, and experts from SBTS worked together with LBNL to analyze the new standards. Based on the engineering and life cycle-cost analyses performed, the most predominant type of room air conditioner in the Chinese market (split-type with a cooling capacity between 2500 and 4500 W (8500 Btu/h and 15,300Btu/h)) can have its efficiency increased cost-effectively to an energy efficiency ratio (EER) of 2.92 W/W (9.9 Btu/hr/W). If an EER standard of 2.92 W/W became effective in 2001, Chinese consumers would be estimated to save over 3.5 billion Yuan (420 million U.S. dollars) over the period of 2001-2020. Carbon emissions over the same period would be reduced by approximately 12 million metric tonnes.

The total costs and impacts of expanding energy use in China will depend, in part, on a number of important factors, an understanding of which is vital for China's policy-makers. These issues include the additional environmental and public health impacts associated with energy use, the economic costs of infrastructure expansion to meet growing energy needs, and the potential role that renewable energy technologies could play if pushed hard in China's energy future. This short report summarizes major trends and issues in each of these three areas.