The European Union (EU) and China will face many common challenges on energy and climate security in the next quarter century. These range from dealing with the challenges of global climate change, securing stable supplies of energy resources to advance national economic development as well as generating innovative market solutions to foster the potential of emerging technologies in meeting climate and energy security needs.
In order to meet these challenges, it may be useful to harness the combined market power of the EU, the world's largest single market, and China, the world's fastest growing economy, to help drive progress towards sustainable development, including a transition towards a sustainable energy and a low carbon future.

Chatham House, E3G, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and the Chinese Energy Research Institute (ERI), in co-operation with the IDDRI and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), have come together to address these issues. Backed by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Global Opportunities Fund, the EU-China Interdependencies Energy and Climate Security project aims to:

• Identify the EU and China's mutual interests, challenges and opportunities on energy and climate security over the next 25 years.
• Generate a shared vision for achieving the goals of both regions in order to strengthen long-term engagement on these issues.
• Produce high quality analysis on the priority opportunities for future collaboration to meet our climate and energy security goals.

Michel Colombier is a Member of the Steering Committee and Jun Li one of the team members of the project.

IDDRI and Jun Li contribute especially to reflexion on increasing the energy efficiency of buildings through EU-China cooperation relating to high building energy efficiency for guaranteeing the energy and Climate security both in EU and China over the next decades within the general framework of "EU-China Interdependencies On Energy and Climate Security". EU-China cooperation with regard to technology, policies and institutions can help to remove the market failures of efficiency development, and meet challenges and achieve their common goal. Cooperation activities will be focused primarily on sharing experiences and expertise in each part, creating business opportunities; promoting co-operation in research and development in high performing buildings technologies; mobilising financial resources for programmes, improving capacity building of political institutions, and facilitating building efficiency market in an environmentally friendly manner.

The team project look at the areas for potential cooperation between the EU and China. The following can be identified as potential areas of cooperation:

• Governance: what lessons can be learned from implementation (or failure to do so) of relevant EC legislation in this area? What have been the successes and failures? What are the key blockages? How to manage the process of spreading best practice, and altering consumer behaviour?

• Knowledge transfer: this is distinct from technology transfer, and concerns the spread and communication of best practice on issues such as building design and renovation. How can EU best practice be most effectively transferred to the Chinese buildings forums? Through international seminars? Through creating networks of construction professionals (linking relevant organisations in the EU and China)?

• Standards setting: Given the current relatively low levels of ownership of household appliances in China, and the enormous projected growth in ownership over coming decades, achieving high levels of efficiency in new appliances in China (and in the EU) is crucially important. How can the EU and China cooperate to set high standards in this area which would deal simultaneously with energy security and climate security concerns? What are the IPR concerns? What about third countries in this process?

• Research and Development: much of the debate in the area of energy efficiency centres on uptake of existing technologies, since the potential energy savings even in the absence of further technological development are so great. The Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC indicates some product areas in which further research is needed. In these areas, how can the EU and China best cooperate to bring such technologies to market?

• Promoting Trade in EE goods: Key questions here include: what is the political economy of trade in this area between the EU and China? What is the current volume of production of such goods in the EU and China, and what is the current level of trade? Who produces lower efficiency substitute goods and would thus object to developments in this direction?