China is still the biggest carbon emitter and polluter in the world thanks to the expansion of thermal power plants and the growing use of coal. Despite its tall claims to cut coal use for electricity generation, China has relied on the highly polluting fossil fuel. China’s coal imports in September 2024 hit a record high of 47.59 million tonnes. Making things further worse, China has continued supporting the expansion of coal power outside the country.
The year 2023 saw an all-time high in coal consumption globally, of which 60 percent was used by China alone. China has dominated the construction of new coal-fired power plants in the first half of 2024 as well. In 2023, it accounted for two-thirds of newly built thermal power stations while it had a whopping 90 percent share in 2022. China has planned at least 103 coal-fired power plants in 28 different countries, which would lead to the release of an additional 430 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
In 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping told the United National General Assembly that no coal-fired power plants would be built in other countries. “China will step up support for other developing countries in developing green and low-carbon energy, and will not build new coal-fired power projects abroad,” Xi has said. However, the situation has not changed.
Rather China has continued to develop new thermal power plants overseas. Helsinki-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CRECA) said China has taken up 8.6 gigawatts of new coal-fired power projects in South East Asia, Central Asia and Africa. Chinese retired just 3.7 gigawatts of coal power units but added 47.4 gigawatts to its operating capacity in 2023.
The latest report by the CRECA revealed that the capacity of China-backed coal plants has increased to 26.2 gigawatts in 2024 from 9.2 gigawatts in 2022, which is in direct violation of the 2021 pledge by Xi, said Daniel Nesan, author of the report. “New coal projects continue to emerge, revealing gaps in the enforcement of China’s pledge, particularly in captive power projects, which exploit a grey area in the pledge,” he said.
Domestically, China has ramped up coal-fired electricity generation even if it claimed to have boosted renewable energy resources to meet emission-cuts targets. According to China Electricity Council, the country’s 60 percent power supply came from coal in 2023. The official data provided by China has always been subjected to doubts as experts felt it may be manipulated. Carlos Torres Diaz, a senior vice president at energy consultancy Rystad Energy, said “While the data isn’t totally clear from China, it is possible that while there may be more coal plants there could also be lower utilization of them.”
China’s coal imports have continued to rise over the years. It increased by almost 12 percent to 341.62 million tonnes in the first three quarters of 2024, according to the General Administration of Customs China. The growing Chinese reliance on coal means the higher global use of the problematic fossil fuel. “When it comes to coal, given that China is such an overwhelming part, whatever happens there really defines the global trend,” Diaz said.
Higher coal use is set to result in higher carbon emissions and thus more severe air pollution. China is set to fail in achieving the climate pledges under the Paris Agreement. Lauri Myllyvirta, a lead analyst at CRECA said Beijing was supposed to reduce carbon emissions by 4-6 percent to meet the emission target as China’s economic growth has been more carbon-intensive’.
Beijing has announced to curb coal use to reduce air pollution in big Chinese cities and make the skies blue again. However, the higher use of coal has rather increased pollution, said Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow at the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations. “The growing dependence on coal power not only thwarts China’s pollution control efforts but also jeopardizes its goal to peak climate-warming emissions by 2030,” he said.