The Chinese National Energy Administration (NEA) has outlined plans to restrict new coal-fired power projects in eight regions across the country taking effect immediately until 2022 in order to further cut air pollution and ease oversupply. The concerned areas are namely: Shanxi, Shandong, eastern-Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Gansu, Ningxia and Xinjiang, all of them having also significant solar and wind resources and therefore not considered as priority for new coal-fired projects. These regions are also known as coal mining heartlands and the NEA estimates that they should halt approvals of new projects and keep a rational rhythm on construction of projects that are already in the pipelines.
Besides, the NEA also warned of possible low investment returns from coal-fired power projects in 10 regions, including Sichuan, Yunnan and Guangxi, where electricity generated from hydropower plants is much cheaper than coal-fired power generation. Coal-fired power projects aimed at exporting their power generation to other regions suffering from power deficits will still be allowed.
China is moving forward with its policy to switch its power generation fleet to gas as part of the governmental objective of cutting air pollution. The government aims to reduce China's coal-fired power capacity by 109 GW by 2020 and to limit its total coal-fired power capacity to below 1,100 GW.
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