WCA January 2016

Industry news

China moves to more power

energy-intensive from China’s east, helping to better absorb the supply of renewable energy locally. According to the national energy administration, average curtailment of solar power in the country is nine per cent, but in September in Gansu the level reached 28 per cent. industries

conventional energy in a local network with peak shaving, in order to reduce the need for constructing grid capacity to export electricity,” it advised. Though the regions should build more transmission lines to increase outbound capacity, the authority also urged them to attract more

CHINA is urging its main wind and solar power production provinces to prioritise transmission of renewable energy over conventional energy sources in a move to get more clean power onto the grid. China has installed more wind farms than any other country, but not all of the power generated by the projects is used due to curtailment, which is a shortage of transmission capacity to connect projects in remote regions to end users. Official data reveals that over 15 per cent of energy generated by wind power in the first half of 2015 suffered from curtailment. Grid companies generally favour conventional energy sources, such as coal and hydro power, over less stable renewable energy sources that also require more investment on grid connections and government subsidised feed-in tariffs. National development and reform commission has urged Gansu and Inner Mongolia to launch pilot projects to tackle the issue, including increasing consumption of renewable energy locally. “Renewable energy should be given priority, complemented by Nuclear plan China plans to invest over $78 billion to build 110 nuclear power plants by 2030. The investment exceeds that of the USA, but Beijing is under criticism for failing to implement sufficient safety measures in existing plants. Beijing-based China Times revealed that China will build six to eight nuclear power plants annually for the next five years and operate 110 plants by 2030 to meet the urgent need for clean energy. According to the same report, the country plans to increase its electricity generation capacity to 58GW by 2020, three times the 2014 level. China currently has 23 nuclear power generating units in operation, with 27 under construction, about one-third of the world’s unfinished nuclear units.

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Wire & Cable ASIA – January/February 2016