Call it the China power paradox: while Beijing leads the world in renewable energy expansion, its coal projects are booming too.<\/p>\n
As the top emitter of greenhouse gases, China will largely determine whether the world avoids the worst effects of climate change.<\/p>\n
On the one hand, the picture looks positive. Gleaming solar farms now sprawl across Chinese deserts; China installed more renewables last year than all existing US capacity; and President Xi Jinping has made the country’s first emissions reduction pledges.<\/p>\n
Yet in the first half of this year, coal power capacity also grew, with new or revived proposals hitting a decade high.<\/p>\n
China accounted for 93 percent of new global coal construction in 2024, the Centre for Research on Energy and Clear Air (CREA) found.<\/p>\n
One reason is China’s “build before breaking” approach, said Muyi Yang, senior energy analyst at think tank Ember.<\/p>\n
Officials are wary of abandoning the old system before renewables are considered fully operational, Yang said.<\/p>\n
“Think of it like a child learning to walk,” he told AFP.<\/p>\n
“There will be stumbles — like supply interruptions, price spikes — and if you don’t manage those, you risk undermining public support.”<\/p>\n
Policymakers remain scarred by 2021\u201322 power shortages tied to pricing, demand, grid issues and extreme weather.<\/p>\n
While grid reform and storage would prevent a repeat, officials are hedging with new coal capacity, even if it sits idle, experts said.<\/p>\n
“There’s the basic bureaucratic impulse to make sure that you don’t get blamed,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, CREA co-founder and lead analyst.<\/p>\n
“They want to make absolutely sure that they don’t block one possible solution.”<\/p>\n
– Grid and transmission –<\/p>\n
There’s also an economic rationale, said David Fishman, a China power expert at Lantau Group, a consultancy.<\/p>\n
China’s electricity demand has increased faster than even record-breaking renewable installations.<\/p>\n
That may have shifted in 2025, when renewables finally met demand growth in the first half of the year. But slower demand played a role, and many firms see coal remaining profitable.<\/p>\n
Grid and transmission issues also make coal attractive.<\/p>\n
Large-scale renewables are often in energy-rich, sparsely populated regions far from consumers.<\/p>\n
Sending that power over long distances raises the cost and “incentivises build-out of local energy capacity,” Fishman told AFP.<\/p>\n
China is improving its infrastructure for long-distance power trading, “but it’s definitely not where it needs to be”, he added.<\/p>\n
Coal also benefits from being a “dispatchable resource” — easily ramped up or down — unlike solar and wind, which depend on weather.<\/p>\n
To increase renewables, “you have to make the coal plants operate more flexibly… and make space for variable renewables,” Myllyvirta said.<\/p>\n
China’s grid remains “very rigid”, and coal-fired power plants are “the beneficiaries”, he added.<\/p>\n
– ‘Instrumental’ economic driver –<\/p>\n
Other challenges loom. The end of feed-in tariffs means new renewable projects must compete on the open market.<\/p>\n
Fishman argues that “green power demand is insufficient to keep capacity expansion high”, though the government has policy levers to tip the balance, including requiring companies to use more renewables.<\/p>\n
China wants 3,600 gigawatts of wind and solar by 2035, but that may not meet future demand, risking further coal increases.<\/p>\n
Still, coal additions do not always equal coal emissions — China’s fleet currently runs at only 50 percent capacity.<\/p>\n
And the “clean energy” sector — including solar, wind, nuclear, hydropower, storage and EVs — is a major economic driver.<\/p>\n
CREA estimates it contributed a record 10 percent to China’s gross domestic product last year, and drove a quarter of growth.<\/p>\n
“It has become completely instrumental to meeting economic targets,” said Myllyvirta.<\/p>\n
“That’s the main reason I’m cautiously optimistic in spite of these challenges.”<\/p>\n
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