The starting point for anyone wanting to understand how the world’s energy markets will develop over the next 20 years must be China. Companies, bankers, investors and those of us who try to follow the industry will have to shift our attention away from local circumstances in Europe or the US. What happens in both continents is interesting, but on the world scale it pales into insignificance. Even a very radical change in the European market — a real carbon price or a single common energy policy, or indeed the development of French and German shale gas — would be as nothing compared to the transformation that is coming, as China becomes the dominant force in every part of the energy business.
要把握世界能源市場今后20年的發展趨勢，必須以中國為出發點。企業、銀行家、投資者，還有其他任何密切關注能源行業的人士，必須把注意力從歐洲或美國本地的形勢轉移開。這兩個大陸發生的事情確實值得關注，但放在全球層面上就沒那么重要了。即便歐洲市場上出現了根本性的變革，比如確定了碳價格或實行了單一能源政策，或者是法國和德國的頁巖氣開發取得了實質性進展，與一個即將到來的重大變化——中國將成為能源產業各領域的主導力量——相比，它們就都不值一提。