Sept. 5 (Bloomberg) — Former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is starting a climate-change program through his
Chicago-based think tank to fund research and advocate for more
aggressive environmental action.
The Paulson Institute’s initiative will begin this month in
Beijing and bring together Chinese and international specialists
to share strategies on reducing the country’s air pollution and
identify ways to measure compliance with government targets, the
group said in a statement yesterday.
“It’s very, very important that we get traction on this,”
Paulson said in an interview. “There’s a lot to be done.”
Ellen Carberry, founder and managing director of the
Beijing-based China Greentech Initiative, will direct the
program, seeking “practical and pragmatic solutions to the
problems of air pollution and climate change.”
Carberry, a former IBM Corp. executive will oversee
research, demonstration projects and advocacy aimed at
addressing climate change and air pollution, the institute said.
Paulson, who met with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a
trip to China in July, said Chinese leaders are determined to
act on environmental issues.
Cleaning up China’s air also will benefit Americans because
airborne pollutants ride the jet stream to the U.S., Paulson
said.
Seattle Announcement
The announcement about Paulson’s program came in Seattle
where the Boao Forum for Asia is holding a conference on energy
and sustainable development. The group is headed by China’s
former ambassador to the U.S., Zhou Wenzhong.
Paulson, 68, the former chairman and chief executive of
Goldman Sachs Group in New York, served as U.S. Treasury
secretary during the global financial crisis. Since leaving
office in 2009, he has used his own wealth to promote
environmentally-sound economic growth in the U.S. and China.
His environmental activities in the U.S. include co-chairing the Risky Business Project, a 2013 effort to highlight
the economic costs of runaway climate change. Along with
Paulson, that project is headed by hedge fund manager Tom Steyer
and Michael Bloomberg, the founder and majority owner of
Bloomberg LP.
To contact the reporter on this story:
David J. Lynch in Seattle at
dlynch27@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Jon Morgan at
jmorgan97@bloomberg.net
Justin Blum