China Stakes Its Claim in Latin American Energy:

development projects.” The goal is to increase the costs and risks of projects that generate high carbon impacts and high indebtedness. 36 Closer to home, the Biden Administration would be well served to promote a more competitive North American economy, working closely with its USMCA partners, Canada and Mexico. On the energy front, the governments of the U. S., Canada and Mexico should work together to revive the North American Climate, Clean Energy, and Environment Partnership launched in 2016 37 and an updated North American strategy to advance renewable and low-carbon energy technologies. This should include efforts to expand the level of cross-border electricity trade and infrastructure investment. Closer cross-border cooperation on electrical transmission is needed not just to promote greater energy security, but also to plan against potentially catastrophic threats, ranging from system failures to cyber-attacks. 38 China’s Oil & Gas investments in LAC It is commonly viewed that Beijing has looked beyond its borders to invest in oil exploration and production largely to satisfy its surging domestic demand for energy. Demand for oil clearly has burgeoned since the

country’s 1978 economic reforms and its opening up to the international community and foreign investment. Beijing’s “going-out strategy” only accelerated as China became the world’s largest energy consumer in 2010. Over the past two decades, Russia, Central Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America have all provided China with petroleum. But beyond its need to satisfy domestic demand, China – since 2017 the world’s largest importer of crude oil - also has invested in overseas oil projects to mitigate its vulnerability to tumultuous oil prices and to reduce its reliance on unstable regional supplies. 39 In sum, Beijing has made a concerted effort to enhance energy security and diversification of supplies and sources.

China uses loan-for-oil exchanges to meet its domestic energy demand and guarantee debt repayment. Photo: Bilfinger SE via Flickr

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