China’s coal boom accelerates as Beijing strengthens energy security
By Paul Homewood
Chinese provinces approved more new coal power plants in the first three months of this year than in all of 2021, as Beijing continues a rapid expansion of fossil fuel generation capacity in an effort to guarantee reliable electricity supplies.
Provincial governments gave the green light to at least 20.5 gigawatts of new coal in the first quarter, topping the 18.5 gigawatts for all of 2021, Greenpeace said in a new research report. Approvals began to soar last year, to at least 90.7 gigawatts, after a series of economy-crippling power shortages, according to the study.
Greenpeace’s report is the latest in a series of research findings and industry comments highlighting Beijing’s plan to rely on its mainstay fuel as a backstop for reliable and affordable power amid rising global fuel prices and the development of intermittent renewable generation. The government is also leaning on miners to boost coal output to record levels to avoid a reliance on foreign supplies.
“The 2022 coal boom has clearly continued into this year,” said Xie Wenwen, Greenpeace East Asia climate and energy campaigner. Reasons given by governments in approval documents included ensuring safe energy supply, meeting heating demand and stimulating local economic development, Xie said.
At the end of 2021, China had 1296 GW of thermal capacity, mainly all coal, an increase of 50 GW over 2020 additions. Last year, according to Bloomberg, another 90 GW was approved, and this year is set to maintain that sort of increase.
For all of the talk of “cheap” solar power, China knows full well it needs an increasing amount of reliable power generation to keep its economy growing. And if it comes from home grown coal, so much the better.
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Looks like the UK taxpayer may have lost £25m on dodgy Indian solar. Shares in one of the UK government’s COP26 “flagship investment” vehicles have been suspended:
https://www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article/market-news/temporary-share-suspension/15928215
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uks-flagship-green-investment-programme-receives-66-million-funding-increase
Who thought selling ultra-expensive solar to cheap coal loving India was a good idea?! I don’t have to query why the net zero media are hushing this up!
Not to worry, Chinese coal plants don’t appear to count according to the IPCC. Its the UK with our couple of remaining coal plants that cause all the problems
Good for China. Now the West has to do the same and start increasing _reliable_ power generation whether coal, gas or nuclear.
Sir
China encourages home grown coal production but we leave ‘greener’ gas in the ground, because we are told it won’t reduce the European gas price and could rattle the odd plate, you couldn’t make it up.
‘The new plants don’t necessarily mean more coal burning — they could sit idle much of the time if new wind and solar generation is enough to cover increased consumption.’
Oh, yeah, the Chinese throw a lot of capital into something they aren’t going to use. The writer thinks the Chinese are stupid like Western governments.
‘But it raises the risk of higher emissions’
You just said they won’t me used, so what is the risk? Well, of course, they will be used and you are full of it.
‘and diverts capital spending that could better be used on low-carbon methods to ensure reliable power supply, such as improved grid infrastructure and increased energy storage capacity’
Oxymoron. Low-carbon, reliable.
Grid infrastructure produces 0 kW.
Energy storage produces 0 kW.
Lorem ipsum.
Of course China is preparing for war with the west. They have taken over the supply of critical materials, like ball bearings, high performance adhesives, Plastics stock chemicals, specialist steels, copper wire, all those building block items. They are now ensuring they have a totally reliable energy supply. In the meantime we are shutting down our production, mainly in Europe, and so when China moves we will run out of everything essential and it will be game over.
Simple.
The young useless idiots currently enjoying police protection as they invade central London believe China’s growth is due to wind turbines primarily.
The controlled centralisation of information is a major cause of their ignorance.
To think sitting in the middle of a road and obstructing an ambulance is clever just shows how stupid these people really are.
Maybe a national advertising campaign is required to spell out that C02 is not the cause of global warming but is intact visa versa.
The only thing that will slow the construction of coal power plants in China is the completion of natural gas pipelines from Russia to China. I suspect the Chinese will first use this natural gas for space heating but there will be a lot of industrial uses in basic raw material production. Europe will be at a tremendous disadvantage to the Chinese if they have to pay market prices for LNG brought in by ship.
Europe and America’s green energy ambitions have a supply chain that is largely controlled by Chinese companies who will be using coal and natural gas to manufacture the steel, aluminum, polysilcon (for solar cells), rare earth elements and battery components the west will use to “electrify everything” and manufacture almost nothing.