Two foreign chemical giants' latest plan to set up an organic silicon factory in east China's Jiangsu Province has bristled some indigenous experts who claim that multinationals have been quietly recasting China into a haven of the world's energy-consuming sectors.

It would not pay to attract overseas investment at the expense of deteriorated environment on home turf, Lu Ming, vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, asserted while authorities in Zhangjiagang, seat of the factory-to-be, are still deliberating on the land acquisition request of the America-based Dow Corning Corp. and the Munich-based WACKER Group.

Revealing no specific amount of their investment, the two well-known chemical companies have decided to expand their presence in China by exploiting the country's silicon resources.

"The export-oriented factory would not only nibble China's scarce silicon reserve but also increase the power transmitting pressure of power generating bases in Sichuan and Shanxi Provinces. The ecologic pollution will be deteriorated as more trees were felled and more greenhouse gas was emitted," Lu said.

Rough estimates by expert Fu Jilai with the China Chemical Information Center showed that an annual output of 100,000-ton organic silicon would consume tens of thousand tons of pure charcoal. The electricity consumption of per-ton silicon would be as much as 14,000 kwhs.

Moreover, dust pollutants and carbon dioxid discharged in the course of production would affect the health of local residents within a radius of 10 kilometers, Fu said.

Since the Kyoto Protocol aiming to reverse global warming has taken effect in February, China who ranks second in energy consumption and carbon dioxide discharge faces a tremendous pressure in cutting greenhouse gas emission.

While developed countries began to employ a number of means to restrict indigenous production of energy-consuming products like electrolytic aluminium, calcium carbide and ferroalloy, these costly sectors gradually moved abroad into developing countries where overseas funds are welcomed to help beef up local economy, academician Zhang Shourong of the Academy of Engineering of China noted.

"With slack market access restrictions on energy-consuming industries, China is becoming one of the havens of the world's major polluters," Zhang said.

According to Monday's Economic Information Daily, the Dow Corning Corp has already established a silicon metal purchasing center in Dalian of northeast China's Liaoning Province in early 2002, making China a crucial supplier of its silicon raw materials.

"Joint ventures of this type indeed lifted up the country's gross domestic product and created job opportunities. The price for it, however, was huge because our energy resources and ecology were sacrificed," Zhang said.

As some local authorities, lured by the superficial achievements in business invitation, simply ignored the long-term interests of the Chinese people to blindly embrace overseas energy-consuming industries and their middle or downstream production lines, experts proposed that the central government become more alert of the intentions of foreign investors.

First of all, China needs to raise the threshold for foreign companies to branch into the country's energy-consuming sectors and map out strict and feasible supervisory standards, they said.

Secondly, a brain trust must be established at various levels so that experts can participate in government decision and give their professional views on the long-term development of the country.

Thirdly, China should balance its imports of all energy products to avoid too much reliance on one singular product and thus disperse the risk of energy shortfall.

Last but not the least, China should make better use of its available resources to beef up the competitive capability of its core energy sectors.

"Only after having our own competitive energy sectors, can we prevent foreign energy giants from conducting depletive exploitation of our limited resources," they agreed.