China Is Installing Renewables Equivalent to Five Large Nuclear Plants Per Week (abc.net.au) 154
The pace of China's clean energy transition "is roughly the equivalent of installing five large-scale nuclear power plants worth of renewables every week," according to a report from Australia's national public broadcaster ABC (shared by long-time Slashdot reader AmiMoJo):
A report by Sydney-based think tank Climate Energy Finance (CEF) said China was installing renewables so rapidly it would meet its end-of-2030 target by the end of this month — or 6.5 years early.
It's installing at least 10 gigawatts of wind and solar generation capacity every fortnight...
China accounts for about a third of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. A recent drop in emissions (the first since relaxing COVID-19 restrictions), combined with the decarbonisation of the power grid, may mean the country's emissions have peaked. "With the power sector going green, emissions are set to plateau and then progressively fall towards 2030 and beyond," CEF China energy policy analyst Xuyang Dong said... [In China] the world's largest solar and wind farms are being built on the western edge of the country and connected to the east via the world's longest high-voltage transmission lines...
Somewhat counterintuitively, China has built dozens of coal-fired power stations alongside its renewable energy zones, to maintain the pace of its clean energy transition. China was responsible for 95 per cent of the world's new coal power construction activity last year. The new plants are partly needed to meet demand for electricity, which has gone up as more energy-hungry sectors of the economy, like transport, are electrified. The coal-fired plants are also being used, like the batteries and pumped hydro, to provide a stable supply of power down the transmission lines from renewable energy zones, balancing out the intermittent solar and wind.
Despite these new coal plants, coal's share of total electricity generation in the country is falling. The China Energy Council estimated renewables generation would overtake coal by the end of this year.
CEF director Tim Buckley tells the site that China installed just 1GW of nuclear power last year — compared to 300GW of solar and wind. "They had grand plans for nuclear to be massive but they're behind on nuclear by a decade and five years ahead of schedule on solar and wind." Last year China accounted for 16% of the world's nuclear-generated power — but also more than half the world's coal-fired power generation, according to this year's analysis from the long-running International Energy Agency. The IEA estimated that in 2023, China's electricity demand rose by 6.4%, and they're predicting that by 2026 the country will see an increase "more than half of the EU's current annual electricity consumption."
And yet in China "the rapid expansion of renewable energy sources is expected to meet all additional electricity demand..." according to the IEA analysis. "Coal-fired generation in China is currently on course to experience a slow structural decline, driven by the strong expansion of renewables and growing nuclear generation, as well as moderating economic growth."
There's also some interesting stats on the "CO2 intensity" of power generation around the world. "The EU is expected to record the highest rate of progress in reducing emissions intensity, averaging an improvement of 13% per year. This is followed by China, with annual improvements forecast at 6%, and the United States at 5%."
Long-time Slashdot reader Uncle_Meataxe shares a related article from Electrek ...
It's installing at least 10 gigawatts of wind and solar generation capacity every fortnight...
China accounts for about a third of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. A recent drop in emissions (the first since relaxing COVID-19 restrictions), combined with the decarbonisation of the power grid, may mean the country's emissions have peaked. "With the power sector going green, emissions are set to plateau and then progressively fall towards 2030 and beyond," CEF China energy policy analyst Xuyang Dong said... [In China] the world's largest solar and wind farms are being built on the western edge of the country and connected to the east via the world's longest high-voltage transmission lines...
Somewhat counterintuitively, China has built dozens of coal-fired power stations alongside its renewable energy zones, to maintain the pace of its clean energy transition. China was responsible for 95 per cent of the world's new coal power construction activity last year. The new plants are partly needed to meet demand for electricity, which has gone up as more energy-hungry sectors of the economy, like transport, are electrified. The coal-fired plants are also being used, like the batteries and pumped hydro, to provide a stable supply of power down the transmission lines from renewable energy zones, balancing out the intermittent solar and wind.
Despite these new coal plants, coal's share of total electricity generation in the country is falling. The China Energy Council estimated renewables generation would overtake coal by the end of this year.
CEF director Tim Buckley tells the site that China installed just 1GW of nuclear power last year — compared to 300GW of solar and wind. "They had grand plans for nuclear to be massive but they're behind on nuclear by a decade and five years ahead of schedule on solar and wind." Last year China accounted for 16% of the world's nuclear-generated power — but also more than half the world's coal-fired power generation, according to this year's analysis from the long-running International Energy Agency. The IEA estimated that in 2023, China's electricity demand rose by 6.4%, and they're predicting that by 2026 the country will see an increase "more than half of the EU's current annual electricity consumption."
And yet in China "the rapid expansion of renewable energy sources is expected to meet all additional electricity demand..." according to the IEA analysis. "Coal-fired generation in China is currently on course to experience a slow structural decline, driven by the strong expansion of renewables and growing nuclear generation, as well as moderating economic growth."
There's also some interesting stats on the "CO2 intensity" of power generation around the world. "The EU is expected to record the highest rate of progress in reducing emissions intensity, averaging an improvement of 13% per year. This is followed by China, with annual improvements forecast at 6%, and the United States at 5%."
Long-time Slashdot reader Uncle_Meataxe shares a related article from Electrek ...
Good (Score:3, Insightful)
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All countries should be doing more to boost their economies.
There are loads of jobs making wind turbines and solar panels, and then even more jobs installing and maintaining them.
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
In general, installing and maintaining stuff only works when the costs of installation and maintenance justify it. Otherwise the country that engages in "boosting their economy" may end up way worse off than it was before the "boost".
As an example from an unrelated economic sector, consider how China has been "boosting" her economy with nothing but government helicopter money after the collapse of another "boost" that resulted in their huge construction bubble, and observe how there are no indications that the latest "boost" is helping their economy.
Maybe they'll do better if they take over and digest the Asian part of Russia. We'll see.
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How can the cost of installing and maintaining renewables and associated infrastructure not justify itself? It's cheap energy, even if you completely ignore the costs of not addressing climate change.
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Where I live the "solar industry" was doing very well while the gubbermint was paying for it, people were selling solar electricity even at night.
Now that the subsidies are gone, quite a few of those "solar farms" are closing down, and where real farming is an option, the solar panels are being removed. With bulldozers, because it is too expensive to dismantle and resell them.
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Spending tax dollars to increase the ordinary citizens quality of life? I'm fine with that
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I agree 100%, and always have. But that's long-term / big-picture thinking. General public / political mindset is more of the short-term. China has a very centralized, very powerful, and very long-term government. They're not voting every six months, for politicians who promise quick fixes. Our (USA / western world) whole economy is a fragile house of cards. We've seen several catastrophes, and near disasters. If we would spend half of entertainment $ on renewables, we'd be much further ahead. We spend $1T
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Please point out where I said China's economy was in good shape.
Something that I don't understand is happening in society- not just online, as in here, but in person- more than ever people seriously misinterpret what others say.
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How can the cost of installing and maintaining renewables and associated infrastructure not justify itself?
This can occur due to oversupply where there is so much intermittent energy available when not needed the value of energy produced becomes insufficient to justify further capital expenditures.
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The Russian economy is booming (literally) now.
Unfortunately, it's all debt financed war production. The whole economy will crash soon.
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The ruzzkie economy is in a tailspin right now: an interest rate of 16%; a huge government deficit; cut off from international supply chains - meaning it "enjoys" a huge increase of import costs; and facing a collapse of their civil infrastructure - the South West regions are now seeing protests and roadblocks after three weeks of power and water supply cutoffs, with no end in sight, and come winter we'll see a perfect storm in power and heat delivery, the precursors of which we saw last February.
The popul
Re: Good (Score:3)
Still beats America's plans of fostering proxy wars everywhere. How many military bases around the world does China have vs the US?
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There are loads of jobs making wind turbines and solar panels, and then even more jobs installing and maintaining them.
There are many more jobs in fossil fuels.
Wind and solar are cheaper precisely because they require less labor.
Switching to wind and solar means fewer jobs in the energy sector, which is a good thing.
If you want to "create jobs", just pay people to dig holes with teaspoons.
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I don't think that's true, especially if you are looking at solar. Of course it's not just the generation either, it's converting appliances over to electric. Electric cookers and ovens, heat pumps/AC, electric vehicles... And the infrastructure upgrades for long distance transmission.
The difference between digging holes and investing in a green transition is that you get tangible benefits and create demand for skills and materials. Lot of countries are struggling to maintain their steel sectors, which are
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I don't think that's true, especially if you are looking at solar.
If solar was more labor intensive, it would not be cheaper.
The cost of the production, installation, and maintenance all end up as wages in someone's pocket, either directly, or indirectly (to people mining the materials, driving trucks, etc.).
It makes no sense to say that solar will both be cheaper and require more labor. It is one or the other.
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Personal solar on your house isn't cheaper, it's just that you own it so don't have to pay someone else for the electricity.
Utility scale solar is cheaper and fairly low labour intensity.
Re: Good (Score:3)
Countries should boost the standard of living and qualityof life of its people. Economic growth is only one pillar of that effort.
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Not if China does it all better than everybody else. And they are more than halfway there.
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All countries should be doing more to remove fossil fuels.
Most countries are not over producing solar panels they can't sell so the Chinese government is propping up the companies by having them installed as solar farms. Same for wind turbines Many western wind projects recently cancelled or delayed their orders while they reevaluate, so the CCP are installing them instead.
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The USA also heavily subsidies it businesses .
It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:4, Insightful)
Sometimes I have to admire how China can do things when they want to. No need for protracted legal battles when you can just tell the NIMBYs and local authorities to that's not was President Xi wants, and he has a capital full of yes-men and an army to make it happen.
Over here we have to deal with people who would rather poison themselves (literally) than admit a Democrat might have a good idea.
Oil lobby (Score:3, Insightful)
still the rate of progress is less than half of that of the EU. The US is far behind because of the oil lobby.
Re:Oil lobby (Score:5, Informative)
"Unlike the US, Europe is close to fully dependent on fossil fuels imported from unstable regions and countries, making it more vulnerable to geopolitical shocks. The war in Ukraine, and subsequent energy crisis, was a wake-up call. In response – seeing that electrification and renewable energy are the best ways to reduce energy dependence, and also that nations with more renewables have been able to reduce the high price of electricity – EU countries decided to accelerate the energy transition." https://www.wemeanbusinesscoal... [wemeanbusi...lition.org]
Re: Oil lobby (Score:2)
Re: Oil lobby (Score:3)
Oh well. We'll survive. Until we don't. Yolo!
Re: Oil lobby (Score:2)
If it was a wake up call, don't let the US push you into provoking economic partners into proxy wars?
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Re:Oil lobby (Score:5, Insightful)
still the rate of progress is less than half of that of the EU. The US is far behind because of the oil lobby.
Because we have an entire political party (Republicans) that are intentionally obstructionist of anything and everything that 'liberals' want, even if it's beneficial to Republicans and Republican constituents. They want to create and perpetuate the illusion that Democrats and other liberals can't effectively govern, while in reality it's Republicans who can't effectively govern. So they block progress on implementation of renewable energy projects, among so many other things -- just because they can.
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Luckily for the US, come November, it will be entering its own pseudo-dictatorship.
What a pity that Pharaoh Donnie is a climate change denying oaf.
Re: It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:3)
And then, the USA will be installing every week coal plants equivalent to ten nuclear reactors. YAY!
Re: It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:5, Informative)
And then, the USA will be installing every week coal plants equivalent to ten nuclear reactors. YAY!
"I promise my administration is putting an end to the war on coal. We're gonna have clean coal, really clean coal [youtube.com]." ~former US President, and 34x convicted felon Donald Trump, (with almost 60 more indictments still on the docket).
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The Democrat lawfare has failed
It didn't just fail. It backfired. Swing voters are more likely to see it as a Democrat abuse of the judicial system for political purposes. The net effect was to help Trump.
the bullets were the next logical step by the "get Trump" team
There's zero evidence that Crooks was part of any group.
Re: It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:5, Informative)
The Democrat lawfare has failed, the bullets were the next logical step by the "get Trump" team that are afraid they can't beat him in the next election.
The shooter was conservative according to people that knew him, registered Republican, range shooting gun club member.
The very likely possibility that he was a Never Trump Republican, or Libertarian, or another bullied loner kid with an AR-15 and half a dozen red flags, terrifies you doesn't it?
Well fuck your feelings snowflake. Conservatives don't like your golden idol worshipping bs either, and this kid shouldn't have had a gun. Deal with it.
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The Florida case is dead. The Georgia case is dead.
You think so? Given the unprecedented nature of the dismissal (i.e. ignoring decades of established precedent that governs case law in that jurisdiction) and the fact that it wasn't tied at all to the recent Supreme Court decision, as well as the fact that the judge's behavior was unanimously repudiated and her decision overturned by the appeals court at an earlier stage of the trial when she tried something far less egregious than what she did with her final ruling, I wouldn't say the case is dead at all.
T
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The Florida case is dead. The Georgia case is dead.
You think so? Given the unprecedented nature of the dismissal (i.e. ignoring decades of established precedent that governs case law in that jurisdiction) and the fact that it wasn't tied at all to the recent Supreme Court decision, as well as the fact that the judge's behavior was unanimously repudiated and her decision overturned by the appeals court at an earlier stage of the trial when she tried something far less egregious than what she did with her final ruling, I wouldn't say the case is dead at all.
The other cases may die in full or in part due to the recent Supreme Court ruling, but the Georgia case may yet have legs, given that it's dealing with state-level election laws pertaining to behavior that falls outside the official responsibilities of a President (i.e. it is not his job as President to get re-elected). To me, it could go either way, but whether or not they'd even win on the merit of the case is an open question as well.
If you read the 82 page ruling from Florida it is well reasoned. The constitution is clear on the process for appointing a major or minor officer and Jack Smith wasn't appointed by either process. Garland could replace him but instead they have given notice they intend to appeal. Even if it wins that will get appealed too, and ultimately it will make it to the Supreme Court. Since her ruling is already quoting Clarence Thomas' legal opinion on the matter the case will probably die there. Even if she hadn
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The Dems have done a lot to alienate people as well. And I say that as a liberal. We need to take a step back and recognize our part in the rise of Trump's popularity or we'll be doomed to repeat it. He couldn't have gained as much popularity as he did without the rising ideological extremism on our side. Most people aren't extremists, so the way to defeat extremism is to offer common-sense moderate po
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The Dems have done a lot to alienate people as well. And I say that as a liberal. We need to take a step back and recognize our part in the rise of Trump's popularity or we'll be doomed to repeat it. He couldn't have gained as much popularity as he did without the rising ideological extremism on our side. Most people aren't extremists, so the way to defeat extremism is to offer common-sense moderate policies for those people. Otherwise, the moderates that make up the majority of our population are left with a choice of two extremes, and many won't choose our brand of extremism.
I'm not American, but I see the problem there as being much the same as it is here in Canada. It used to be whoever was in power did not make a whole lot of difference to my life. Taxes might go up or down, some services might be added or removed, but generally speaking life went on much the same. Politicians today however are butting much more into people's personal lives than they have in the past. Now whoever is in power can have a profound effect on every individual, so yeah, it is not surprising it
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When someone claiming to be a liberal implies that a Democratic Party consisting mainly of centrists and conservatives are left-wing extremists, my bullshit detector goes off. And touting Donald Trump as "popular" only raises the Bullshit Alert to Stage 2.
Here's what's happening here on Earth: The wealth disparity in America has become so extreme that billionaires now find the Constitution unbearable to their whims, so they've gotten together and decided t
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Over the past several years I've expanded my sources of news information, which includes some moderate-right sources, and it has been completely eye-opening. During that process I've watched people's views shift in real-time toward the right. According to many of the people making that shift, it's not because they're attracted to Tru
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I never stopped. All I have to do is listen to Republicans talk for ten minutes to be reaffirmed in my opinions about them. Small example: That Vance fella recently praised Alex Jones as a "truth-teller." This would be the psychopath who made up stories about school shootings being hoaxes and encourage his cult-followers to stalk and harass grieving parents, and had a billion-plus-dollar defamation suit turn out against him. My l
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Anyone who sees their own viewpoints as completely objective has no hope of seeing through the eyes of others, which was the primary objective I was advocating. Unfortunately, many other people feel the same way and it's this air of arrogance that many on our side have which is yet another contributing factor to repulsing moderates and pushing them further to the right.
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You are unbelievably full of shit. At a certain point, someone telling you it's a mere opinion that water is wet is just a gaslighting Orc turd who thinks he's being clever.
And continuing to push the utterly delusional and insane narrative that Democrats, who have practically done nothing (yet) to fight the GOP coup unfolding around them, are "arrogant" and repulsing "moderates" (who the GOP r
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Then I guess I might as well vote for Trump. Congrats - you've made another convert!
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Authoritarian state says: "We're already in the 2030s over here!"
Skeptic replies: "And you still will be in the 2060s."
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I *think* you overstate the voice that people directly have in China, but I *know* people commonly overstate the voice that people directly have in the US.
The basic principle of every stable government is "don't really piss off anyone powerful enough to overthrow you". That was what the Magna Carta was about.
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Re: It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:3)
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The sad things is we used to be like that. Build a supersonic airliner? Send humans to the moon? Dig a tunnel under the English Channel? Build a nationwide network of electricity and telephone cables?
High speed rail is a great example. Japan pioneered it, France lead the way in Europe... And then we just sort of gave up for the most part. Then China comes along and builds more than the rest of the world combined in two decades, and is continuing to expand it and add even faster maglevs for popular routes. O
Re: It's easy when you're a psuedo-dictatorship. (Score:2)
Uh, Animal Farm is about fascism. Orwell used literal pigs for the fascist faction... He couldn't beat you over the head with the message any harder than that.
Duty Cycle (Score:2, Interesting)
Because solar only operates 4-7 hours a day, the capacity factor is about 1/5 of the time (10-25%), while nuclear is 92%. So nuclear is 4.6 times as much energy generation for the same nameplate capacity. So China is only installing about 1.23 nuclear plants worth of renewable a week...which is still amazing and more than 50 times faster.
Re:Duty Cycle (Score:4, Insightful)
Wind and solar are both mentioned in the summary, so your argument and all your numbers are invalid.
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Because solar only operates 4-7 hours a day ...
If only China had access to the country with the largest battery production so they could store any excess solar/wind-generated energy for use at night -- oh, wait, it's China.
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
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The wind blows at night, too.
Demand is also much lower at night, especially if you insulate adequately, to reduce heating demand.
Now that recyclability has become a priority for wind turbine blades these problems are being solved somewhat neatly. Sooner or later someone will figure out how to do them cost effectively without all the epoxy, just to bring the costs down.
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
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There's a lot of China. They are not just installing lots of generation capacity, they are installing a lot of transmission capacity as well. When is there no wind anywhere in China?
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
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China has LOTS of mountains, so hydro could be sufficient. Especially if they have enough solar power to pump water uphill during the day time.
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Hydro has been the solution for BC as well, at least until the last couple of years of drought. Hydro depends on rain and glaciers, both which have been in short supply.
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Correctly, 1.23 nuclear plants of *solar*. If you include wind, which works 24/7, the capacity factor is much higher.
Offshore it's around 50% now, less on-shore.
And in fact solar never operates for just 4 hours a day in China. In winter in Beijing, generation starts around 7 AM and finishes around 5 PM, and most of the commercial scale PV is installed well south of there.
As TFA notes, they also have the world's longest distribution lines.
Re: Duty Cycle (Score:2)
Because solar only operates 4-7 hours a day
While the country works with only one timezone, their territory spans an area large enough that it is possible that some peaks of solar production in the East coast will be very useful for morning consumption in the West.
Since the West has vast regions with lower population density and potential for huge solar farms, it might happen that their afternoon peak product helps a lot with the evening peak consumption in the East.
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There's a reason why they're building their solar farms in the western part of the country. It's a desert.
air pollution (Score:2)
Air pollution is a significant cause of illness and death in China. It has been linked to various health issues, including respiratory diseases, cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer. Air pollution contributes to millions of premature deaths annually in China, it's comparable to smoking. The economic costs run into hundreds of billions of dollars each year.
Would you like more detailed information on specific health impacts or economic costs?
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Part of the story (Score:5, Interesting)
China also added 37 nuclear reactors in the last decade [economist.com]. With 250 in operation planned for 2035.
The global picture here is that a huge share of renewables is good, but needs to be complemented with a stable supply of electricity: ideally hydro, then preferably nuclear, and in last resort gas/coal.
This is also exactly what we are seeing happening in Germany, with the share of coal/gas somewhat steady at 25-30%.
TL;DR: a working electricity mix is a diversified mix (with solar/wind/hydro/nuclear being the best one to decarbonize an electricity grid).
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Caveats: Two-way hydro, so you can store by uphill pumping. And batteries. Nuclear is far down the list because of all its absurd externalities.
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Nuclear doesn't have absurd externalities, everything has them but nuclear is unique in paying for some of them.
Either way attacking nuclear is fighting the wrong battle. It's fossil field which have by far the biggest unpaid externalities. Both nuclear and renewables are vastly vastly better.
Re:Part of the story (Score:4, Interesting)
The reason I make a point of this is that nuclear is a greenwashing locus, for the political segment that sees the writing on the wall but doesn't want to give up the kind of centralized control that fossil fuels allow. It's not the most important thing to criticize, but it's worthwhile to call out lobbyist sleight-of-hand.
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Nuclear externalities are massive, because you have to include things like needing a highly skilled nuclear regulator, controls on proliferation, waste management etc. And as we have seen in Japan, the cost of a single accident is astronomical.
Even if it was cheap though, most countries wouldn't be in a position to have it. Either we don't want them to (proliferation) or it would make them dependent on others for their vital infrastructure.
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I expect most of those nuclear plants will be cancelled. The rate at which they are being build doesn't indicate that they are still planning to build that many.
The rate at which renewables are expanding, plus the fact that they technology can be exported without proliferation issues, and the importer doesn't need an entire nuclear regulatory framework and organization and insurance scheme, combined with the fact they can be deployed on months rather than decades, has dramatically changed everyone's plans.
C
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It'll be all batteries for the stability side before long. All fission plants will be retired long before their life span is up. Even hydro will be supplanted in the end.
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"All fission plants will be retired long before their life span is up." is already a false statement. Whether they should have been I can't really say, but there are currently several plants operating beyond their originally designated retirement date.
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I was talking about China's fresh additions over the last decade. The ones in the main article.
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a working electricity mix is a diversified mix (with solar/wind/hydro/nuclear being the best one to decarbonize an electricity grid).
Yes, China knows what they are doing, and they are doing it right. Intermittent renewables backed by reliable base load backup, whether it be hydro, nuclear, or even coal.
The people who think we will maintain a functional society with just renewables and batteries are quite obviously doomed to fail. I'm just going to sit back and watch them fail, content in the knowledge I am not participating or complicit in their failure. Have at it, count me out.
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Batteries in the wider sense include pumped hydro, and in that sense there can be used to stabilize the grid with a mix of hydro/solar/wind. Nuclear could also be used as a base load, but has LOTS of problems. It's expensive, it takes a long time to build, it's really hard to decommission, and the "waste" really needs to be recycled, but that threatens nuclear proliferation, Molten salt reactors could probably, in principle, solve those problems, but that's a technology that isn't quite ready yet.
OTOH, I
Sure sun and wind are consistent. (Score:2)
Are the industries really green if they devices are not recyclable?
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Are the industries really green if they devices are not recyclable?
No. That's why nuclear is not green, but wind and solar are.
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Wind and solar are also not currently recyclable. The solar cells eventually wear out, and the windmill blades aren't currently recycled. (Last time I said that someone pointed at a particular company that made a model of blade what it claimed to recycle...but even if true that's a very small minority.)
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Windmill blades are now at least sometimes being made to be recycled, and even the old ones are good for stuff. You can use them to cover car parks or whatever, it's not like they will disintegrate tomorrow. As well, we are finding new ways to recycle them. They are a small amount of total manufacturing capacity. The impact is noticeable, but still low.
Solar panels are also recyclable. But there is little large scale industry for doing so because they last so very long. Most of the panels made in the sevent
Not counterintuitive (Score:2)
>"Somewhat counterintuitively, China has built dozens of coal-fired power stations alongside its renewable energy zones"
This isn't counterintuitive at all. They are not obsessed with "green" and so-called "climate crisis" "emergency" or whatever other label. I believe their main objectives are to have energy independence and enough energy. It is also why they are building lots of nuclear plants and coal plants, as well. Essentially, throwing everything at the two problems, simultaneously.
Dagnabbit! (Score:2)
Stinkin' Chinese takin' all the wind. Gonna stop the earth one day--all those wind mills! Tarnations!
I'm rootin' tootin' madder than cat on a griddle.
[Crumples up hat and stomps it into the dust.]
"Tofu dregs"? (Score:4, Interesting)
I sincerely hope that all of this electrical capacity is built to far better standards than the buildings, bridges, roads, and other civil infrastructure in their cities. Everything I've read and seen strongly suggests that Chinese construction is rife with corruption, and taking disastrous and sometimes lethal shortcuts is the rule rather than the exception. I've seen a lot of video of buildings and bridges falling apart and down, wet and dry fire fighting risers not working, etc.
Is a lot of that anti-Chinese propaganda? Quite possibly. But is it being faked? I don't think so - a lot of it is cell-phone footage with audio that I don't think even the best of today's "AI" could produce. So I'm very wary regarding the construction standards of these new power installations - especially so given the rapid pace of construction.
now just wait for a merkin (Score:2)
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Sorry almost missed it.
Fit twern't the earth turnin' buy gawd those Chinese'd steal 'tall down to the last ray.
And the earth weren't flat an' all that, after all. I do my own research. Know a thing or two.
How many? Is it even possible? (Score:2)
Back envelope calculations show that it would be about 90E6 panels per week (average plant producing 1GW and with 320W solar panels). This sounds... improbable. Granted, they also install wind... but still. Considering 52 week/yr... for how many years now?
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This is China. Remember their size.
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This I believe.
But apparently, China does produce 861GW of solar panels per year (2023 stats), which averages to over 2T of solar panels (~400W avg per panel), staggering!
So every week they cover 200km^2 of ground with solar, huh!
China will dominate that market (Score:2)
Not only will they have most manufacturing capacity, they will by far have the most experience with the technologies used and hence will produce the most cost-effective products. Think China getting AI is a threat? It is not. This here is. And it is all to due to the anti-green morons.
No Funny here (Score:2)
Another large discussion with no humor. Sadness.
However, at least this story is not an obvious target for humor. In the long and even medium term this is a big loss for the rest of the world...
Re: (Score:2)
The article clearly says that, "Despite these new coal plants, coal's share of total electricity generation in the country is falling."
Those coal plants are just filling the gaps for stability of the grid. It's a makeshift solution on the way to 100% renewables. They'll be swapped out for high capacity batteries once the tech has advanced enough.
Re: (Score:2)
Only if they're actually used. And if all 18 are run at half capacity then that's less coal burnt than 10 at full capacity.
Re: (Score:2)
You left out the 6 or so old inefficient coal plants that were decommissioned and replaced by the newer, cleaner (other pollutants), more efficient coal plants.
Re: (Score:2)
Actually what it seems if "off-topic".