Industrial Ecology and Clean Development in East Asia

Rapid industry‐led growth in East Asia over the past three decades has resulted in deteriorating air and water quality, escalating energy use and attendant increases in greenhouse gas emissions, and other serious environmental concerns. Current efforts to strengthen environmental regulatory institutions are in many cases overridden by the scale effects of urban‐industrial growth. We examine policy approaches that support a shift toward an alternative trajectory of economic development that is less energy, materials, and pollution intensive. Given that a large proportion of the capital stock in the developing market economies of Asia has yet to be built, we argue that influencing the energy, materials, and pollution intensity of new industrial investment is both a critical opportunity and a policy imperative. Our research indicates a need for greater integration of environmental, industrial and technology policies within the region. Such policy integration should link reductions in energy, materials and pollution intensity to efforts to upgrade the technology and industrial capability of the developing market economies of East Asia.