Yunshi Wang, director of the new ITS-Davis China Center for Energy and Transportation (C-CET), has just returned from a five-week trip to China

SPREADING THE WORD: China Center Director Returns from Five Week Tour

Yunshi Wang, director of the new ITS-Davis China Center for Energy and Transportation (C-CET), has just returned from a five-week trip to China to introduce the Institute’s newest international automotive research program and explore opportunities for collaboration.

Wang visited universities, government officials and industry representatives in seven cities. He presented a paper at the Shanghai Forum hosted by Shanghai Fudan University and visited Shanghai Jiao Tong University. He represented ITS-Davis at the ceremony marking the 100th anniversary of Tongji University, also in Shanghai. UC Davis and Tongji have a reciprocal relationship; two ITS-Davis students, Jonathan Weinert and Jason Ni, have been conducting their PhD research at Tongji for the past two years. In Beijing, he visited Tsinghua University, met with a California government representative stationed in China, and stopped by the Energy Foundation’s China office. He also visited General Motors’ China headquarters and, accompanied by ITS-Davis alums Ling Li, Ph.D. and Wenlong Jin, Ph.D. (now professors at the University of Science and Technology of China), Chery Automobile, China’s largest domestic auto company.

The overarching goal of C-CET is to forge research partnerships with premier Chinese universities to enhance understanding of China’s evolving energy and transportation sectors and to provide input to policymaking in the U.S. and China. Nissan has generously provided initial start-up support for C-CET.

C-CET is pursuing five near-term activities. They are:

• Establish collaborative research and information relationships
• Analyze consumer demand for vehicles and fuels
• Analyze fuel distribution and supply
• Develop transport energy models and databases
• Analyze government policy

Wang seeks to make C-CET the leading international center for the study of transportation energy activities in China – one that builds on ITS-Davis’s existing network of leading analysts and scholars from around the world. In addition to coordinating research projects by ITS-Davis students and researchers and collaborating with researchers in China, Wang also will conduct his own research on China’s energy supply and demand.

“China has significant energy security issues,” he explains. Prior to 1993, China was a large exporter of petroleum products. But now it’s the world’s third-largest importer and second largest consumer of petroleum, he says. “Close to 50 percent of China’s petroleum products are imported -- and it’s growing.

“Because of the explosive growth of China’s energy use and cars, there are many synergies between China and the U.S. Energy is one of the few issues where there’s an opportunity for strategic dialogue between the two countries,” says Wang, an economist with a background in international relations.

Wang grew up in Shanghai, and came to the U.S. 18 years ago for grad school. He has worked at the United Nations and World Bank. In addition to his position at ITS-Davis, he is co-authoring a book on China’s economy with MIT Dean Emeritus and Professor Lester Thurow.