At the beginning of 2018, Alan Rozich, a sustainability and environmental technology expert in Pennsylvania, first became executive foreign expert for sustainability for the city of Zibo, Shandong province, then chief science officer for Shandong Borun Process Industrial Technology Co.

As a scientist and engineer with a strong interest in resource sustainability, Rozich's connection with China started when Borun's Lexington, Kentucky-based Birtley Industrial Equipment contacted him to work on environmental projects in China.

"About two and half years ago they were trying to recruit professionals who are interested in being a foreign expert," Rozich recalled. "I went to the first symposium in 2016, and they started to file for grants for environment-related projects. By the time the grant came, I disconnected with another company and joined them."

With a PhD in environmental engineering, Rozich first worked as an assistant and research professor at the University of Delaware, then he joined ERM first as its program manager then principal to run wastewater technology program. Later, as principal at PMC, and chairman and CEO at BioConversion Solutions, he accumulated vast experience in applying advanced biological conversion technologies.

Rozich has numerous patents and has published and presented more than 100 technical and research papers. With a keen interest in global sustainability, Rozich recently published Other Inconvenient Truths Beyond Global Warming to address key science and engineering needed for resource sustainability.

"I think there are more opportunities in China for projects with sustainability in mind. I understand the pattern and challenges we face. A lot of things I said about how to approach sustainability ...I believe that China has it," Rozich said in explaining his decision to work with China.

Rozich said that China appears to have a national commitment, and everyone is on board for sustainability.

"The thinking is down to the whole population. For example, when I go to a Chinese hotel, I would notice this small detail that Chinese hotels only provide two pieces of paper for writing," he said. "In the US, you would get a full stack of paper. Sustainability seems deep in Chinese society's thinking," he said.

In contrast, Rozich views sustainability in the US as just too much talk and slow progress.

"We have Hollywood stars that talk about it. After the talk, they fly private jets to go back to their 15,000-square-foot houses, and they produce big carbon footprints," Rozich said.

"I feel like I have more in common with Chinese in sustainability. People feel the sense of urgency in China, and China is trying to do it for the economy," he said.

"China is interested in moving a lot of people efficiently, but the US is still stuck with highways," he said. "It's more energy efficient to have bullet trains than individual automobiles."

Rozich was involved with $100 million worth of projects for creating renewable resources, energy, high-grade fertilizer and water from diverse biomass feedstocks over a 20-year period. Yet he finds that working with Borun in China is much easier to turn his vision into reality.

He admires Borun's founder, Chen Bing. "He is visionary. He might not get the recognition like Alibaba's Jack Ma, but he learned from the ground up; he saw some of the needs in China, what it takes to meet the needs and also does it in a way to make business sense. He got that internal will or moral compass to do it right.

"I often tell people to forget about the environment. If you think about how people characterize pollution, it's bad stuff in the air, water and ground," he said. "However, that's the wrong way to look it. In fact, what we are doing is that we are taking resources we can otherwise use, resources we misplace in the water, air and ground.

"We are recovering those resources to make it renewable, to enable China to manage the resources revolution that China and the rest of the world will face," he said.

Rozich believes that what he is doing will help the world deal with the rising demand for energy and resources from a growing middle class worldwide.

"McKinsey on the West Coast has forecasted that China and India, in the next five years, will put another 3 billion people in the middle class. That's progress, but that one class will require not double but four to five times more resources. The strain on fossil fuels, other finite resources, and the economy will be unprecedented and unpredictable. What's your option? Renewables, of course."

mayzhou@chinadailyusa.com