Climate activist Greta Thunberg has been briefly interrupted by a man who approached her on stage after she invited a Palestinian and an Afghan woman to speak at a climate protest in the Dutch capital.
China is hitting peak carbon years ahead of schedule. This year, they deployed more solar than the entire installed capacity in the United States (and DOUBLE the installation volume last year). They hit peak oil this year, years ahead of estimates even a few months ago. China is so far ahead of their Paris Agreement climate goals it’s not even funny. This is, of course, all without considering China’s massive reforestation efforts which simultaneously combat growing desertification and pull CO2 out of the air. China is also targeting peak coal in the next year or two and, based on the rate of renewables deployment, seems to be on track to do so. Every single tangible target and projection is getting blown out of the water and there’s no reason to expect that to slow down because renewables make more economic sense than fossil fuels.
China is shifting from using coal for base load to using coal to smooth out demand peaks: the idea is to have a bunch of fossil fuel plants idling until demand can’t be met by renewables. This isn’t just my opinion, though: it’s corroborated by analysts at S&P Global and others. Rolling blackouts became a huge issue last year and fossil fuels are still one of the most flexible sources of energy to deal with peaking demand. In fact, China recently instituted a policy to pay coal plants to stay off. Coal plant utilization in China has already dropped from a high of ~70% to about 53% (US: 49.3% coal, 57% natural gas).
This is, of course, even as China’s carbon-intensive construction industry contracts and investment shifts towards lower carbon manufacturing in the form of electric vehicles, solar panels, semiconductors, etc.
This progress has been made with hundreds of billions of dollars in government investment (that could have been spent elsewhere…) and from the government intentionally sacrificing short-term GDP growth from the real estate industry in exchange for reduced emissions from construction.
China is hitting peak carbon years ahead of schedule. This year, they deployed more solar than the entire installed capacity in the United States (and DOUBLE the installation volume last year). They hit peak oil this year, years ahead of estimates even a few months ago. China is so far ahead of their Paris Agreement climate goals it’s not even funny. This is, of course, all without considering China’s massive reforestation efforts which simultaneously combat growing desertification and pull CO2 out of the air. China is also targeting peak coal in the next year or two and, based on the rate of renewables deployment, seems to be on track to do so. Every single tangible target and projection is getting blown out of the water and there’s no reason to expect that to slow down because renewables make more economic sense than fossil fuels.
China is shifting from using coal for base load to using coal to smooth out demand peaks: the idea is to have a bunch of fossil fuel plants idling until demand can’t be met by renewables. This isn’t just my opinion, though: it’s corroborated by analysts at S&P Global and others. Rolling blackouts became a huge issue last year and fossil fuels are still one of the most flexible sources of energy to deal with peaking demand. In fact, China recently instituted a policy to pay coal plants to stay off. Coal plant utilization in China has already dropped from a high of ~70% to about 53% (US: 49.3% coal, 57% natural gas).
This is, of course, even as China’s carbon-intensive construction industry contracts and investment shifts towards lower carbon manufacturing in the form of electric vehicles, solar panels, semiconductors, etc.
This progress has been made with hundreds of billions of dollars in government investment (that could have been spent elsewhere…) and from the government intentionally sacrificing short-term GDP growth from the real estate industry in exchange for reduced emissions from construction.