• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
  FEATURED
Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA June 4, 2023
Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest June 4, 2023
Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing June 4, 2023
2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season June 4, 2023
Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion? June 1, 2023
Next
Prev

China’s Latest Renewables Plan Could Bridge Global 1.5°C Gap, Expert Says

August 7, 2022
Reading time: 3 minutes

Brian Jeffery Beggerly/Wikimedia Commons

Brian Jeffery Beggerly/Wikimedia Commons

8
SHARES
 

China’s fourteenth five-year plan (14FYP) shows the country could build enough wind and solar capacity to reach its emissions peak ahead of schedule, but continuing coal investments raise doubts.

“To the extent that the new 14FYP for renewables can meet or overperform on its goals, it would also contribute to China’s effort to peak carbon emissions early and help bridge the global emission reduction gap towards a 1.5°C pathway,” writes Hu Min, principal and co-founder of the Innovative Green Development Program (iGDP), a public policy consultancy that specializes in sub-national climate action.

  • The climate news you need. Subscribe now to our engaging new weekly digest.
  • You’ll receive exclusive, never-before-seen-content, distilled and delivered to your inbox every weekend.
  • The Weekender: Succinct, solutions-focused, and designed with the discerning reader in mind.
Subscribe

Released earlier this year, the 14FYP maintains China’s pledge to produce 25% of its energy from non-fossil sources by 2030. Although the new plan deviates from its predecessor in some significant ways—including doing away with mandatory generation capacity increase targets—the new plan raises the ambition of China’s renewable energy transition, Min writes.

She points out that the 14FYP requires “newly increased renewable generation make up more than 50% of the incremental electricity consumption,” meaning that “at least half of the increase in demand be covered by renewables.”

The Green Development Program projects that the new plan will require China to scale up renewable power by 150 terawatt hours per year. (A terawatt hour or TWh equals a billion kilowatt hours, and is used to measure the energy consumption of whole countries.) In comparison, China raised capacity by 100 TWh per year during the previous FYP and recorded a 255-TWh increase in 2021. In each of its three most recent FYPs, China exceeded the targets it had set for renewable energy capacity.

The new FYP also raises the bar for China’s wind and solar capacity, which it will now need to ramp up by at least 100 gigawatts a year. That’s more than the 75 gigawatts per year needed for the NDC, “meaning that the renewable plan is likely to overperform,” Min says.

China’s renewable energy sector is already seeing rapid growth. Hundreds of local authorities across the country have partnered with solar developers to fulfill a national plan to cover 50% of all new public buildings and factories with solar panels by 2025, which complements another plan to install solar on existing buildings, reports Climate Home News.

The plans drove a year-on-year solar capacity increase of 140% in the first five months of 2022, prompting Lauri Myllyvirta of the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air to hail the “blistering growth of China’s solar power installations” and describe the policy as “ambitious and smart.”

But China’s continued use of coal raises doubts about the country’s emissions reductions measures. Recent disruptions to the world’s energy markets—caused by events like the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—have caused the country to backslide on its coal phaseout efforts as its focus shifts to immediate energy security. Although China says it aims to start cutting coal consumption in 2026, it also started building 33 gigawatts of new coal-fired power generation capacity last year, more than in any other year since 2016, reports the Globe and Mail.

China is taking some measures to ensure that its climate progress leads to results, such as restrictions on issuing permits for new coal power plants unless the projects are supplementary to renewables. But “there is still a risk that China’s growing coal capacity could run counter to the country’s efforts to decarbonize its energy mix,” Min says.



in China, Clean Electricity Grid, Coal, COP Conferences, Ending Emissions, Solar, Wind

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

sunrise windmill
International Agencies & Studies

Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA

June 5, 2023
147
Pixabay
Solar

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
130
Clairewych/Pixabay
Buildings

Demand Surges for Giant Heat Pumps as Europe Turns to District Heating

June 4, 2023
87

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

/MaxPixels

‘Substantial Damage’, No Injuries as Freight Train Hits Wind Turbine Blade

May 25, 2022
14.6k
sunrise windmill

Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA

June 5, 2023
147
Natural Resources Canada

2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season

June 4, 2023
170
Pixabay

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
130
Oregon Department of Transportation/flickr

Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing

June 5, 2023
86
debannja/Pixabay

Austin, Texas Council Committee Backs Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty

June 4, 2023
92

Recent Posts

Clairewych/Pixabay

Demand Surges for Giant Heat Pumps as Europe Turns to District Heating

June 4, 2023
87
nicolasdebraypointcom/pixabay

Factor Gender into Transportation Planning, IISD Analyst Urges Policy-Makers

June 4, 2023
39
moerschy / Pixabay

Federal Climate Plans Must Embrace Community-Driven Resilience

June 4, 2023
55
Equinor

Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion?

June 1, 2023
879
Ottawa Renewable Energy Co-op/Facebook

‘Hinge Moment’ for Humanity Demands ‘YIMBY’ Mentality: McKibben

June 1, 2023
79
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Notley

Notley Would Have Backed Carbon Capture Subsidies, Smith Less Certain: Ex-Pipeline Exec

June 1, 2023
100
Next Post
David Wilson/wikimedia commons

U.S. State Treasurers Use Public Office to Thwart Climate Action, Investigation Finds

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}