Online Class Notes (Jesse)

1. 8/28

New Years when I was 12 – I celebrated it at home with a group of truck drivers I didn’t know. The dining room was extremely crowded with a dozen drivers. I shuttled back and forth among them, to help my mother set the candlelit table.

The wind was howling outside the window. It was an unprecedented New Year with the worst snow disaster in history occurring in southern China. My hardly-ever-snow hometown was almost buried by the blizzard. Traffic was interrupted, and the power grid collapsed. The highway was full of trucks that couldn’t get home to their families, and we decided to accommodate those drivers.

These strangers who came into my home on New Year’s Eve made me suddenly realize that there must have been countless people suffering in this blizzard, all while I was warm and safe at home. I gave up my bedroom to the drivers. When I curled up on my parents’ bed, listening to the heavy snow outside the window, I was saddened. My home could only accommodate a dozen people, but how I wished that everyone trapped in the snow could find a place safe and warm to stay. Are snowstorms really a natural disaster that humans cannot stop? (It planted a seed in my mind with the question, “Are snowstorms really a natural disaster that humans cannot stop?”)

Six years later, I was proudly sitting in a classroom of the best college for atmospheric science in the country – the seed had sprouted – and I had begun to feel quite frustrated upon learning that climate disasters are not, in fact, unrelated to humans. Burning fossil fuels, deforestation, unsustainable farming – human activities are increasing the frequency and scale of extreme weather and climate disasters, not only in the country where I live, but in every corner of the world. When I was studying at Yale School of the Environment, in the teaching building with a roof made of solar panels, I learned about the impacts of human activities and industrialization, and also learned about the efforts of scientists and progressive sectors to turn the tide.

Not long after, I found myself spending a winter in the Gobi, northwest of my motherland. People there have lived in cave dwellings for hundreds of years. In winter, they rely on burning firewood and corn cobs for heating. The air pollution is serious and the incidence of lung cancer remains high. As a volunteer for the China Clean Stove Project, I helped cave dwellers with energy renovations, including repairing roofs, doors and windows, putting insulating coat on walls, installing solar roofs and clean stoves.

Stop after stop, door to door, I always drove the truck with supplies as fast as possible, despite the poor condition of the roads. The project was funded by a charity organization with a million dollars. It would cost $2,000 to renovate a cave dwelling and the entire project could only help 500 families. When I settled this account, I strongly felt that I was not doing enough. Charity alone is the solution to the symptoms but not the root cause. What was once just a seed, was now a garden enjoyed by hundreds of people.

As I started working as a consultant, in a recent project serving a company planning to expand its business to new energy vehicle, I was asked to develop a China market plan. Later in the project when I reviewed our pre-final presentation, I realized that considering a solar energy solution in China seems to be a more beneficial option for our client in the long run in China. Without hesitation, I proposed to the partner to include this suggestion in the report, but was challenged at the reliability and scientificity of the suggestion.

The more I learned, the more confident I felt / the more determined I was …. environment is declining, the economy is growing, renewables are coming to the forefront of people’s minds, now is the time, and I am the one to bring it to the world. I felt the roots taking hold – what was once just a seed, had grown and taken shape into what now felt like it would become a whole forest of new life. 

[Showing leadership, convincing client blah blah]

[My vision]

Worldwide, the clean technology market is worth more than 2.8 trillion USD a year in 2019, expected to double by the mid 2020s, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate of ~10%.

With the soaring need for alternative energy led by rising population and economic activities, strong regulation support, and increasing urgency for environmental protection, China has pledged toward cleantech development.

By 2019, China’s green investment had reached USD 3 billion, which constitutes 3% of the GDP. Cleantech investment ecosystem in China has accumulated 600+ deals with over 50 billion USD invested.

In my childhood, I didn’t think I could be able to change even a snowflake in the climate disaster. After four years of undergraduate study and two years of graduate study at Yale, I learned how to forecast the future atmosphere / If my 4 years at Yale learning about future atmospheres taught me anything it’s that ….. add main point. Now I learned, environmental science is not only temperature, humidity and wind speeds, but could also be solar energy, biofuels, and wind energy. Business, enabling all technologies, rather than merely forecasting, is shaping the future.

With all my experience working with scientists, entrepreneurs, professional managers, consultants and investors, I confirmed that it is my calling to promote the cleantech industry, to embrace further innovation, and to make a real impact on climate change.