China Announces Huge Expansion to Coal-Fired Power Plant Capacity

­The biggest polluter in the world just announced a huge addition to their emissions repertoire — the People’s Republic is set to massively expand their coal-fired power plants.

China occupies a unique place in the world — the Communist behemoth is the largest polluter on Earth, and it’s not even close. In 2020, their 9.9 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions was greater than the next two polluters, the U.S. and India, combined.

This massive emissions output is due, in no small part, to China’s preeminent place as the manufacturing capital of the world and their reliance on coal-fired power plants.

China’s also the premier epicenter for lithium-ion batteries, though that, too, introduces a host of emissions and e-waste issues.

Nonetheless, like most economic powerhouses, China has a long-term decarbonization plan, though theirs is a bit more conservative than most. While the EU and the U.S. are striving to be carbon-neutral by 2050, China’s giving itself an extra decade. They hope to be carbon-neutral by 2060.

Though their recent announcement of a massive expansion of coal-fired power plants can’t possibly help their decarbonization goal.

China framed the announcement, which occurred at the COP27 summit, as an energy security measure. Now…given the Russo-Ukrainian War’s cascading effect on energy prices, especially for the EU countries that leaned heavily on Russia for oil and natural gas, you can’t entirely blame China.

At this point, even some of the biggest green powerhouses like Germany are quietly restarting coal-fired power plants to stave off a looming energy catastrophe for the winter. 

Reversing earlier plans to shut down numerous coal plants by the end of 2022, Deutschland has resurrected or extended the lifetimes of about 20 such facilities – like the Bexbach and Weiher hard coal-fired power plants, which returned to the grid as of Oct. 28 and Oct. 31 – for a total of about 6 additional gigawatts of coal power capacity.

Germany is still abiding by its Coal Phase-Out Act, which seeks to end coal-powered energy in the nation by 2038 in order to “reduce emissions and provide the public with a safe, a cost-effective, an efficient, and a climate-compatible energy supply.”

But they also don’t want an energy-induced economic recession or rolling blackouts during the coldest part of the year.

And if one of the most conscientious green stalwarts is (temporarily) embracing fossil fuel, one can imagine what the world’s biggest polluter will do.

2022 already bore witness to historic emissions levels, plus China’s aforementioned place atop the emissions hierarchy.

So if they succeed in adding 270 gigawatts of coal-fired capacity (which would make China’s total 6x the size of the U.S.), it certainly seems like the People’s Republic is working against their own decarbonization plans.