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China to reach renewable power goal 5 years early, report says

Experts say Beijing should still revisit its continued reliance on coal for power.

This photo taken on August 31, 2018 shows wind turbines in the Dabancheng District in Urumqi in China's northwestern Xinjiang region.

 AFP

The boom in renewable power projects in China will likely help the country reach its 2030 target five years early, boosting the effort to limit global carbon emissions far faster than expected, a new study said.

China is on track to double its solar and wind power capacity and shatter Beijing’s ambitious 2030 target of 1,200 gigawatts (GW) five years ahead of schedule if all prospective projects are successfully built and commissioned, said the Global Energy Monitor (GEM) report, released on Thursday.

Solar panel installations alone are growing at a pace that would increase global capacity by 85% and wind power by nearly 50% by 2025, said GEM, a San Francisco-based non-governmental organization that tracks energy projects worldwide. 

China has approximately 379 GW of large utility-scale solar and 371 GW of wind capacity projects that have been announced or are in the pre-construction and construction phases. They will likely be finished by 2025, adding roughly the same amount of currently installed operating capacity. 

The report projected that China would likely achieve the provincial targets of approximately 1,371 GW for wind and solar, which is higher than the 1,200 GW President Xi Jinping announced his government would install by 2030. 

“This new data provides unrivaled granularity about China’s jaw-dropping surge in solar and wind capacity,” said Dorothy Mei, project manager at Global Energy Monitor. 

“As we closely monitor the implementation of prospective projects, this detailed information becomes indispensable in navigating the country’s energy landscape.”

Half global renewable capacity in China

China has emerged as the frontrunner in global renewable energy, leveraging a blend of incentives and regulatory policies to host approximately 50% of the world’s operational wind and solar capacity.

The report said the ambitious renewable push has been geographically widespread, with every province and most counties developing large-scale solar and wind power. 

China’s operating scale solar capacity has reached 228 GW, more than the rest of the world combined.