Wind has overtaken nuclear as an electricity source in China.

[bananas]

http://www.earthtechling.com/2013/02/wind-power-overtakes-nuclear-energy-in-china/

Wind has overtaken nuclear as an electricity source in China.

by Earth Policy Institute

In 2012, wind farms generated 2 percent more electricity than nuclear power plants did, a gap that will likely widen dramatically over the next few years as wind surges ahead. Since 2007, nuclear power generation has risen by 10 percent annually, compared with wind’s explosive growth of 80 percent per year.



<snip>

Over the course of 2011 and 2012, China connected four reactors with a combined 2,600 megawatts of nuclear generating capacity, bringing its total nuclear installations to 12,800 megawatts. Although officials still claim that China will reach 40,000 megawatts of nuclear capacity in 2015, the current pace of construction makes this appear increasingly unlikely. China’s inexperience with Generation-III reactors also casts doubt on its prospects for achieving what the government now sees as a more reasonable 2020 goal, some 70,000 megawatts.

<snip>

China should easily meet its official target of 100,000 megawatts of grid-connected wind capacity by 2015. Looking further ahead, the Chinese Renewable Energy Industry Association (CREIA) sees wind installations soaring to at least 200,000 megawatts by 2020. With the seven massive “Wind Base” mega-complexes now under construction in six provinces—slated to total at least 138,000 megawatts when complete in 2020—the CREIA projection seems well within reach.

China’s overall wind energy resource is staggering. Harvard researchers estimate that China’s wind generation potential is 12 times larger than its 2010 electricity consumption.



<snip>

Editor’s Note: EarthTechling is proud to repost this article courtesy of Earth Policy Institute. Author credit goes to J. Matthew Roney.

[kristopher]

1. Report: More Than 100 Gigawatts in the China Wind Pipeline

Report: More Than 100 Gigawatts in the China Wind Pipeline

Details from the new GTM Research/Azure International China Wind Market Quarterly


HERMAN K. TRABISH: FEBRUARY 22, 2013
The long-term plans of China’s biggest wind developers, as detailed in the new GTM Research/Azure International China Wind Market Quarterly: 4th Quarter 2012, reflect a renewed commitment to renewables by the Chinese government.

“The government appears to be back in the game of promoting the domestic renewable energy market,” according to the report. New policies, including new additions to the government’s 2013 targets for solar (10 gigawatts) and wind (18 gigawatts) and a streamlining of access to subsidy funding, are expected “to act as a counterweight to forces outside of China that have hurt the wind and solar sectors.”

Recent signs of an improving domestic Chinese economy and waning anxiety about Europe’s financial crisis add to growing optimism in China’s renewables sector, according to the report.

Though major Chinese wind manufacturers like Goldwind (HKG:2208), Sinovel (SHA:601558), and Ming Yang (NYSE:MY) struggled through the same kind of inventory clearing losses China’s solar panel manufacturers had to endure in 2012, developers fared better, thanks to pipelines that only slowed installation activity gradually and ongoing revenues from past projects.

China’s top three wind developers are...

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Report-More-than-100-Gigawatts-in-the-China-Wind-Pipeline?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=headline&utm_campaign=GTMDaily

This is a teaser for a $$ report by GTM. The headline says it all...

[OnlinePoker]

2. Progress, but only against nuclear

From the article, it says the capacity of grid connected wind is 75,600 MW and they want it to go up to 200,000 MW by 2020. This would take their wind generated electricity up to around 265 TWH if you extrapolate from the chart in the article. As a commentator at the bottom of the article pointed out, however, even though it only grew at an annualized rate of 11.5% in 2010, coal generation increased by 337 TWH in that year alone. With the rapacious nature of Chinese manufacturing and a growing middle class wanting a North American (or even European) standard of living, I can't see this increase in electricity demand abating anytime soon.

[kristopher]

3. The Chinese are serious about addressing climate

China to Tax CO2, Reform Coal and Water Pricing
China leapfrogs the United States in greenhouse gas (GHG) policy.

ERIC WESOFF: FEBRUARY 22, 2013

...

This year China leapfrogs the United States in greenhouse gas (GHG) policy. According to China Daily, "China will proactively introduce a set of new taxation policies designed to preserve the environment, including a tax on carbon dioxide emissions, according to a senior official with the Ministry of Finance. The government will collect the environmental protection tax instead of pollutant discharge fees, as well as levy a tax on carbon dioxide emissions."

According to Xinhua, the official press agency of the Chinese state:

"It will be the local taxation authority, rather than the environmental protection department, that will collect the taxes."
"The government is also looking into the possibility of taxing energy-intensive products such as batteries, as well as luxury goods such as aircraft that are not used for public transportation."
"To conserve natural resources, the government will push forward resource tax reforms by taxing coal based on prices instead of sales volume, as well as raising coal taxes."
"A resource tax will also be levied on water."

When and how the new policy will be implemented was not specified in the article.

Nancy Pfund, Managing Partner at DBL Ventures, had this to say, "As a major source of carbon emissions, China’s move to implement a carbon tax is good news for the planet, and good news for cleantech investment. China is already a leader in supporting the growth of clean industries to the tune of billions and billions of dollars, from solar to clean transportation to wind, and putting a price on carbon with a tax will drive more demand, as well as more innovation. If this policy comes to fruition, I would expect to see more activity on the part of U.S. cleantech companies in China, a trend which we are already witnessing. Finally, China’s leadership in pricing carbon will have ripple effects across the world and raise the bar for U.S. energy policies and those of other nations. When a country as large as China and as economically important as China makes a move like this, the global momentum on climate change suddenly gets a lot more inexorable."

...

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/China-to-Tax-CO2-Reform-Coal-and-Water-Pricing?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=headline&utm_campaign=GTMDaily