ChinaWind Energy Development Roadmap to 2050 was first published on Wednesday and China’s wind power generating capacity could reach one terawatt (1TW) by 2050.
The capacity would provide as much as 17 percent of China’s electricity output by 2050. It was estimated mat cost of wind powered electricity will be below mat of coal-fired power in China beyond 2020, when the current wind power subsidies would be phased out gradually.
WANG Zhongying, deputy director for the Energy Research Institute of National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), was speaking at the China Wind Power 2011 conference and exhibition on Wednesday. According to WANG, on-shore, near-shore and offshore wind power in China will develop in various degrees in the next forty years, and annual installed capacity would reach 30 gigawatts (GW) between 2030 and 2050, accounting for half of the country’s total new installed capacity.
The development roadmap set forth total installed capacity targets for 200GW, 400GW and 1TW by 2020, 2030 and 2050, respectively. Wind power would be one of main sources of electricity, and generate about 17 percent of China’s electricity output in 2050.
The Development Roadmap lays out the following:
1. By 2020, on-shore development is still the focus, and off-shore demonstration projects will be conducted.
2. Between 2021 and 2030, equal importance will be attached to bom on-shore and off-shore development, and far off-shore demonstration projects will be conducted.
3. Between 2031 and 2050, on-shore, off-shore and far off-shore wind power will be fully developed in Eastern, Central and Western China.
It was estimated mat China’ s electricity consumption will reach 13,000TWh in 2050. With the existing wind power technology, China wind power resources may facilitate over 1TW of wind power installation capacity.
In 2010,41.46GW and 31.31GW of wind capacity were installed and grid-connected respectively. On-grid wind power reached 50TWh in 2010, approximately 1.2% of the 4200TWhtotal consumption for the year.
HAN Wenke, director for the Energy Research Institute of NDRC, commented,“The development roadmap lays out forecasts and targets for the future development of wind power industry, providing guidance and ground for future development plans by NDRC and relevant authorities to formulate plans. “
Since 2006, wind power has adopted the fixed tariff policy. The premium of feed-in tariff by wind power over the desulfurized coal-fired power shall be covered by the Renewable Energy Development Fund. And a subsidy of RMB0.01-0.03/kW was granted for grid connection, with actual subsidy varying from wind farms and existing transmission distance.
WANG Zhongying believes that the current cost of onshore wind power falls in the range of RMB 0.35-0.50/kWh, and the relevant tariff varies from RMB0.51/kWto RMB0.61/kW. In the current pricing mechanism, and without factoring in the coal resources and environmental costs, cost and tariff of wind powered electricity is higher man those of coal-fired power.
While the rise in coal-fired power tariff is inevitable, he continued, cost of wind powered electricity is expected to reach parity with coal-fired power around 2020, and even lower when the cost of long-distance transmission is not factored into the calculation.