The MIT news on October 6, 2008 featured an article “MIT report debunks China energy myth: the problem isn’t the technology, it’s the operations” by David Chandler. An interesting and detailed analysis of China’s powerplants by MIT suggests:

…the widespread notion that outmoded energy technology or the utter absence of government regulation is to blame for that country’s notorious air-pollution problems. The real issue, the study found, involves complicated interactions between new market forces, new commercial pressures and new types of governmental regulation.