Fueling Asian modernization

During upcoming industrialization, the human population of Asia will exert a strong influence on both the Pacific Rim environment and the total earth system. We review energy-use trajectories both likely and possible on the continent, taking the historical market penetration series as a framework. Today, the People's Republic of China is coal rich, but as its economy grows in the short term, fuel substitution from solid fossils will occur. Major automakers will exploit new niches in the Orient, adding petroleum to the mix of fuels and producing photochemical smog on the regional scale. Demand is rising in coastal cities for cleaner fuels such as natural gas, but they must be imported. Nuclear industries in India and China are small and expanding only slowly. The Tibetan plateau confers exceptional hydroelectric potential but peripheral concerns plague the big dams. Solar and hydrogen are decades from implementation even in Europe. Fossil resources are largely remote from the Asian consumer class. The disconnect feeds back into the design of new transportation networks. Since for the moment development lags, the option exists to view Asia as a crucible for the techniques of cogeneration, sequestration and pollutant recapture.