The biggest carbon emitter added coal-fired capacity in 2020, offsetting declines elsewhere
LAST YEAR was a bad one for coal in much of the world. As countries went into lockdown, demand for energy plummeted. With many workers obliged to stay at home, and financing for coal projects proving ever more difficult, the development and construction of coal-fired power plants stalled. There was one bright spot, however. According to apublished this week by Global Energy Monitor, an American NGO, China commissioned 38.4 gigawatts of coal-power plants in 2020.
But just because China has commissioned more coal-fired capacity does not mean that it will use it. Because so many coal plants are built to serve economic targets rather than energy needs, the country has a glut of around 400GW of excess coal-fired capacity. The average thermal power plant in China generates only about 50% of its total capacity.
Still, if the world is to reach the goal of the Paris agreement, of limiting global warming to 1.5°C by 2100, coal will have to be phased out soon. Last year China was the only country to move further away from the conditions needed to meet the 1.5°C target, although OECD and non-OECD countries alike still have a long way to go . China’s 14th Five Year Plan, released on March 5th, sets a target of increasing the share of non-fossil energy consumption from 16% in 2020 to 20% in 2025.
China is not the only country still clinging to coal. Joe Biden, America’s president, has called for his country’s power sector to be decarbonised by 2035. But on current trends, only one-third of America’s coal-fired power capacity will have been retired by then. Germany, India and Japan all commissioned a net increase in coal plants in 2020. But China is the land of big numbers, and in ending the world’s dependence on coal it will be China that matters most.