17 turbines generate electricity at the Jintangfeng wind farm in Zhoushan, East China's Zhejiang Province. Photo: cnsphoto

China celebrated its eighth annual National Low-carbon Day on Thursday, aiming to raise public awareness of energy efficiency and promote a low-carbon economy. 

During an online ceremony, the country launched The Climate Investment and Finance Article Call 2020 event, in a bid to address global challenges in climate investment and finance and deal with climate change.

Starting from early August, the organizing committee will collect writings on innovative concepts and industrial practices. The authors or teams are required to submit their work before January 10, 2021, according to a report from China.org.cn.

An expert panel will review and select outstanding articles that meet international standards of excellence, generate innovative findings and potentially deliver policy influence, said Xie Zhenhua, China's special representative for climate change affairs.

Soliciting articles about climate change, mainly launched by scientific research institutes and financial institutes, helps in further deploying low-carbon technologies like CCUS (carbon capture utilization and storage) that require large capital investment and long development cycles, Guan Dabo, a professor at Tsinghua University told the Global Times on Thursday. 

He said China could lead global growth of the green economy with government policies and financial support, given its efforts to develop renewables in the energy mix and reduce carbon emissions. 

China was the largest contributor to renewables growth, at about 0.8 Exajoules (EJ) in 2019, followed by the US at 0.3 EJ, and Japan at 0.2 EJ, according to BP's Statistical Review of World Energy 2020.

In China, the low-carbon component of energy R&D grew by 10 percent in 2019, with big increases in R&D for energy efficiency and hydrogen in particular, while government energy R&D spending in 2019 grew by 3 percent to $30 billion globally, according to a special report on clean energy innovation released by the International Energy Agency (IEA) on Thursday.

In the future, in addition to further reducing energy intensity and optimizing energy efficiency, China will further increase their products' added value, Guan noted.

However, planned investment could be affected by the economic impact from the COVID-19 pandemic, the IEA said.

If governments rise to the challenge created by the COVID-19 crisis, they will have an opportunity to accelerate clean energy innovation, the IEA noted.