Speaker-WEIQIU CAO (Mike)
Mr. Cao Weiqiu (Mike) currently serves as a member of the Climate Investment and Finance association of the Chinese Society for Environmental Sciences. Meanwhile, he holds the positions of General Manager at Shanghai Qingfang Technology Co., Ltd. and Executive Director at Shanghai Muyi Investment Consulting Co., Ltd. Previously, he worked as a Senior Research and Strategic Planning Officer at the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), where he was in charge of the Asia-Pacific Demonstration Zone Project for Smart Agriculture and Food Safety.
With years of in-depth experience in the fields of sustainable development and climate response, Mr. Cao has long been committed to basic theoretical research in these areas, as well as research on industrial and sectoral development. Leveraging over 20 years of experience in technology industrialization services, he has effectively transformed and applied theoretical research results, continuously contributing practical efforts to ESG development and carbon neutrality initiatives.
In terms of academic research, Mr. Cao has achieved remarkable results. In industrial practice, he focuses on high-tech enterprises in the early-stage fields of sustainable development and carbon removal. Based on in-depth research into the pain points and bottlenecks in the industrialization of green hydrogen, he founded Shanghai Green Carbon & Green Hydrogen Technology Co., Ltd. aiming to promote the implementation of affordable green hydrogen and green carbon industrialization projects. The affordable green hydrogen and green carbon industry is expected to fundamentally address a series of key issues, including methane emission reduction, carbon removal, Scope 3 decarbonization, green and low-carbon transformation of carbon nanomaterials, and the economic viability of green hydrogen production.
As a strategic emerging industry prioritized for cultivation under China's 14th Five-Year Plan, the carbon nanomaterial industry covers key materials such as graphene and carbon nanotubes. In recent years, driven by the explosive demand in fields including new energy batteries, flexible electronic devices, and aerospace composite materials, it has achieved leapfrog development. However, from the perspective of green and low-carbon development, the issues of high carbon emissions and pollutant discharges throughout the industry's full life cycle have become increasingly prominent, and this has evolved into a critical bottleneck restricting the high-quality development of the industry under the dual-circulation strategic framework.
Currently, the preparation of carbon nanomaterials mainly relies on traditional fossil energy and high-energy-consumption processes. The high energy consumption in graphite purification at the raw material end, the dependence on fossil energy in traditional production processes (e.g., high-temperature cracking) at the manufacturing end, and the extended carbon footprint caused by the difficulty in decomposing waste materials at the disposal end collectively create full-chain emission pressure.
Under the dual-circulation pattern, the internal circulation faces predicaments such as low industrialization conversion rates of low-carbon technologies and the lack of a carbon footprint management system for the supply chain. Meanwhile, the external circulation needs to address green trade barriers like the European Union's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), as well as pressures from international competition in low-carbon technologies.
Based on an in-depth analysis of restrictive factors—including insufficient resilience of the industrial chain in the internal circulation and difficulties in adapting to green standards in the external circulation—this study puts forward recommendations for the green and low-carbon development of the carbon nanomaterial industry in two directions.
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