Chinese renewable energy investment abroad soars – but coal still dominant
- Greenpeace study of growth in energy projects in Belt and Road Initiative countries shows solar investments rocketing
- But coal capacity continues to rise after earlier study had found China was supporting more than a quarter of all new coal-fired plants worldwide
Chinese equity investment in solar, wind and coal power projects in Belt and Road Initiative countries surged from 2014 to 2019, with planned capacity up more than tenfold compared with the previous five-year period, environmental group Greenpeace has said.
According to a study published by Greenpeace on Monday, China’s wind and solar power investments in belt and road countries amounted to 12.6 gigawatts since the initiative was launched in 2014. It had invested in just 0.45GW of solar before 2014.
The country has also invested in 67.9GW of new coal-fired power in belt and road countries since 2014, but Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner Liu Junyan said the increase in the share of renewables should be welcomed.
“Chinese investors’ ratio of coal to solar is now the same at home and abroad – both are still six to one [in favour of] coal, unfortunately, but I’m amazed to see what five years of equity investment in solar made possible,” Liu said.
China has been building dozens of new renewable energy projects at home to reduce the share of coal in its total energy mix to 59 per cent by the end of last year. It has also been encouraging its existing coal-fired power plants to install ultra-low emissions technology.
China was expected to put another 40GW of solar power capacity in operation at home this year, energy officials said on Friday.
China’s total coal-fired capacity was also expected to rise by another 45GW this year, with the total eventually expected to peak at around 1,300GW, up from 1,140GW at the end of last year, researchers from China’s State Grid said this month.
