The Energy Policy Cooperation Between China and the European Union

Abstract

This article deals with crucial political aspects of the cooperation between the EU and China in the field of energy, focusing not only on the institutionalized forms of cooperation, but also on the larger context of the Sino-European energy cooperation, including the issues of climate change, China’s internal political dynamics and the PRC’s investments in the EU. For China, the EU member states are not sources of energy resources themselves, but they possess important and valuable technologies and know-how; they also present business opportunities for Chinese energy enterprises. There is no automatic convergence of interests between these the two political entities; however, energy presents a potentially fruitful area of cooperation for both the EU and China, including in terms of fighting climate change and building a low-carbon economy, and this is even more so the case with the Trump administration in charge in the U.S.