Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) – China wants to reduce its dependency on coal and oil. Garbage and waste can generate methane gas, a clean and renewable fuel, for use in rural areas. It also plans to build new, environmentally-friendly ‘Eco-Cities.’ All that is needed is a decisive intervention by the government.

In Yanan village (Shaanxi) a pilot project by the North-Western A&F University in Xian has been able to turn pig waste into methane gas. The Sunflower energy scheme uses waste from piggeries and human households to produce biofuel energy from pits dug under farmers' pigsties and next to the villagers' toilet.

As the waste in the container decomposes under anaerobic conditions, it generates biogas that is stored in a gas holder and piped into the house to run appliances, such as stoves, lamps and, in some cases, water-heaters.

Eventually the semi-solid residue left after the decomposition is used as organic fertiliser.

With help from provincial authorities, a total of 1,294 of these biogas plants have been installed in rural farming households since 1999. Before that villagers had to use wood and coal.

This type of technology is important for several reasons. For instance, a projection by the Shaanxi Environmental Protection Bureau shows coal consumption per person in the province will soar from 0.94 tonnes in 2000 to 1.6 tonnes by 2010.

By comparison, households equipped with biogas are estimated to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 60 per cent, carbon monoxide and sulphur dioxide by 80 per cent, and dust particles by 90 per cent.

There are some obstacles though. As much as the biogas system sounds ideal for the province, each installation costs 3,500 to 4,500 yuan to build, something that is unaffordable for most villagers in such a poor region.

For this reason, Mei Ng Fong Siu-mei, former director of Friends of the Earth (HK), is trying to raise funds to pay for this project.

The biogas installations are especially appropriate for small villages rather than cities.

On Chongming Island near Shanghai, Arup, a global design and engineering company, is planning Dongtan, an ‘Eco-City’ where all energy will be renewable with no petrol-fuelled cars, for the 2010 Shanghai Expo. Its initial population is expected to be 8,000 and swell to 80,000 by 2020.

Still many experts note that most energy use and pollution are due to industrial production, not personal or family activities.

For this reason the deputy director of the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), Pan Yue, said that the government should create a business environment that encourages environmental protection rather than relying solely on administrative measures to protect the environment.

Together with the China Insurance Regulatory, SEPA and the Ministry of Finance have set up a special taskforce to research ways to use tax policies to curb pollution, Mr Pan said.

Together with the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, the SEPA will also announce new insurance measures to encourage “green insurance,” he said.