According to research that was made public on Thursday, nearly two-thirds of the world’s large wind and solar power plants that are currently under construction are located in China.
As a result, the growing capacity for renewable energy sources has reduced coal’s share of the generation mix to new lows. China is building 339 gigawatts (GW) of utility-scale wind and sun powered, or 64% of the worldwide aggregate, a report from U.S.- based think tank Worldwide Energy Screen (Pearl) found.
That’s more than eight times the 40 GW of projects in the pipeline of the second-ranked United States.
The authors of the report stated that China’s speed puts the global goal of trebling renewable capacity by the end of 2030 “well within reach” even without additional hydropower, and they urged China to raise its climate pledges to the United Nations next year.
According to a report released last week by the Sydney-based think tank Climate Energy Finance, Beijing is also on track to achieve its own goal of installing 1,200 GW of wind and solar by this month in 2030—six years ahead of schedule.
According to GEM research analyst Aiqun Yu, China’s coal-centric grid faces challenges in absorbing the surge in renewable energy sources. Additionally, the development of transmission lines must be accelerated.
Despite this, a separate analysis that was released on Thursday by Carbon Brief indicated that the new capacity helped propel renewable generation to new all-time highs. According to the analysis that was carried out by Lauri Myllyvirta, a senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute, if the trend continues, China’s carbon emissions may have peaked last year.
In May, a record low of 53% of its electricity came from coal, and a record 44% came from non-fossil fuel sources. Coal’s portion was down from 60% in May 2023. As China added a significant amount of new capacity, solar power reached 12% and wind power reached 11% of power generation in May. The remaining non-fossil fuel power came from hydropower at 15%, nuclear power at 5%, and biomass at 2%.
Carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector, which accounts for around 40% of China’s total emissions, decreased by 3.6% in May as a result of more renewable generation.
Myllyvirta wrote, “China’s CO2 output is likely to continue falling, making 2023 the peak year for the country’s emissions if current rapid wind and solar deployment continues.”
According to his analysis, solar power production increased to 94 terrawatt hours (TWh) in May, a record 78% increase year-over-year. The National Bureau of Statistics of China reported a 29% increase, but the data did not include rooftop solar panels, which meant that about half of the electricity from solar was missed.
Using data on power generating capacity and utilization figures from the China Electricity Council, an industry association, the new analysis calculated solar and wind output.
The year-over-year increase in wind power generation to 83 TWh was 5% driven by a 21 percent increase in capacity offset by lower utilization due to variations in wind conditions.
When compared to the previous year, when hydropower was impacted by drought, production rose by 39%. Gas-terminated age fell 16%, and power age from coal fell 3.7%, even as complete power request expanded 7.2% year-on-year.
