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China to close 31GW of coal power plants
February 4, 2009 - by Emma Ritch, Cleantech Group
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China is replacing 31 gigawatts worth of coal-fired power plants with newer models.
The government said today it plans to shut some of its smaller, most inefficient coal-fired power plants, with 13 GW of capacity set to close this year, 10 GW in 2010 and 8 GW in 2011.
The National Energy Commission plans to replace the highly polluting plants with large, energy-efficient coal plants with a combined capacity of 50 GW.
Similar plans led to more than 34 GW of the most-inefficient plants being taken offline from 2006 to 2008. In 2007, the government closed 14.38 GW, surpassing its goal of closing 10 GW. And in 2008, the government beat its goal of 13 GW by closing 16.69 GW of plants.
"We should grasp the opportunity arising from the current decline in power demand to speed up the closure of small power plants and their replacement with large ones," said Zhang Guobao, head of the National Energy Commission to the Shanghai Securities News.
Replacing coal-fired plants with newer models has some benefits in reducing emissions. China's coal plants consumed an average of 370 grams of coal per kilowatt hour in 2005. By using newer coal technologies, the government reduced the average consumption to 349 grams per kWh in 2008. And new plants, such as the 1 GW Huaneng Power International coal plant in Yuhuan, can generate a kWh with just 283 grams of coal.
China had about 792.5 GW of power generating capacity at the end of 2008.
While China focuses on using the most-efficient forms of coal-derived power, other countries have moved to ban dirty coal outright, including New Zealand and Canada (see New Zealand to ban new gas or coal fired generators and Canada to require carbon capture and storage by 2012).
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