Chinese capacity installations of solar and wind power jumped last year as the country continued to lead in global additions and beat its own record of annual installations.
Last year, China’s solar power generation capacity surged by 45.2%, while wind power generation capacity rose by 18% compared to 2023, data from the country’s National Energy Administration showed on Tuesday.
The jump in installed solar and wind capacity topped the overall increase of 14.6% of total installed power generation capacity in the world’s second-biggest economy.
“China aims to support the reasonable consumption and utilization of more than 200 million kilowatts of newly added renewable energy annually over three years to ensure that the utilization rate of renewable energy nationwide reaches at least 90 percent,” according to a document released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the administration earlier this month.
By adding about 277 gigawatts (GW) of solar capacity and another 80 GW of wind capacity in 2024, China beat its own record of annual renewable capacity additions.
Last year, China already achieved its target to install 1.2 TW of wind and solar capacity by 2030 six years early.
At the end of 2024, China connected one of the world’s largest solar power projects by capacity to the grid. The Ruoqiang PV project is a giant 4-GW solar project in the southeastern part of the Taklamakan Desert, developed and operated by China Green Electricity Investment.
The solar project is part of the Chinese government’s plan to have its emissions peak by the end of the decade.
At the end of last year, China was already on track for another record-breaking year for solar capacity additions.
However, the Chinese boom – supported by cheap materials and policy support from the central and local governments – has started to bite into the profitability of solar equipment manufacturers.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
