The energy sector will get the bulk of the mainland's science and technology investment, according to a draft of the Ministry of Science and Technology's five-year plan for 2011-2015.
Although it is just a draft and subject to the approval of the National People's Congress meeting next month, Minister Dr Wan Gang has already inverted the hourglass of the plan by including more than a dozen research and development (R&D) deals with US partners that will require a total investment of more than US$10 billion.
Most of the money will go to clean-energy sectors such as nuclear, wind and solar power. With that much money at his disposal, Wan hopes Chinese and American scientists and engineers, the world's two largest emitting countries, can achieve technological breakthroughs to lessen global dependency on oil.
But Wan's interest in clean energy should not be overemphasised, because when he addressed more than 4,000 of the mainland's best scientific minds at the annual meeting of the China Association for Science and Technology in November in Fuzhou , Fujian , Wan promised the fossil fuel sector two-thirds of the R&D investment in energy for the next five years, whatever that allocation turns out to be.
He said deep-sea and deep-earth exploration for fossil fuels and mineral resources would rival the clean-energy sector and see the biggest growth of R&D funds.
In the clean-energy sector, although wind and solar power has received most support from environmentalists and media attention, the nuclear energy industry will quietly get more of the R&D budget.