The bad news: China is still building and operating coal plants by the dozens per year. The good news: The nation’s share of wind and solar power will rise to 40 percent of China’s total installed power generation capacity by the end of 2024, up from 36 percent at the end of 2023. What’s more, in 2023 the total installed capacity of power from non-fossil fuel sources had already exceeded 50 percent of the total generation capacity.
Clearly, Chinese leaders are fed up with their dreadfully polluted air. But the bigger motivation is almost certainly its effort to become the global leader in solar, wind and other renewable technologies that can be exported to countries around the world. Some have likened the emerging market for renewable energy technologies as tantamount to a second computer revolution. The United States dominated and was lavishly enriched by computer innovations during the world economy’s move from analog to digital technologies. China hopes to be in the catbird seat — and similarly enriched — by the global migration from fossil fuels to renewables.
The new numbers out of China mean the country remains on track toward sourcing 80 percent of its energy needs from non-fossil fuel sources by 2060, according to the China Electricity Council. China’s non-fossil fuel energy mix includes nuclear and hydropower, which already account for more than half of the power-generating capacity of the world’s second-biggest economy.
Meanwhile, the share of coal-fired power is expected to fall to 37 percent of the total installed capacity by the end of 2024, from 39.9 percent in 2023, the CEC report forecast.
Hao Yingjie, secretary general of the China Electricity Council, is quoted in the South China Morning Post stating: “Judging from the investments, growth rate of power-generation capacity and changes in power structures, the power industry continues to advance the trend of green and low-carbon transformation.”
China is currently the world’s largest producer of climate-warming greenhouse gases, and its power sector is the largest contributor to these emissions. The country aims to be carbon neutral by 2060.
Mike Consol (m.consol@irei.com) is senior editor of Real Assets Adviser. Follow him on X (@mikeconsol) and LinkedIn (linkedIn.com/in/mikeconsol) to read his latest postings.