Despite record solar and wind capacity additions and booming renewable energy output, China is not giving up on coal, on the contrary.
During the first half of 2025, China commissioned as much as 21 gigawatts (GW) of coal power, the highest amount in the first half of the year since 2016, the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and Global Energy Monitor (GEM) said on Monday in their H1 2025 biannual review of China’s coal projects.
Projections are that coal capacity commissioned for the full year would exceed 80 GW.
Globally, China is the leader in renewable energy capacity installations, but it is also a leader in coal-fired power and continues to be the key driver of record-high global coal demand.
In addition, China is looking to boost its domestic coal demand and prices this year. Coal prices in China have been depressed this year, weighing on the profits and profitability of the coal producers.
Despite previous signs of slowdown in coal power last year and a clean energy boom so far this year, coal power remains strong in China, with new and revived projects the highest in a decade, clean energy proponents CREA and GEM said in their half-year report.
The surge in coal plant commissioning follows the jump in coal project permitting in 2022 and 2023, when China was permitting, on average, two new coal power plants every week. The years 2022 and 2023 saw more than 100 GW of coal power capacity approved in each of the two years.
“This trend will likely continue into 2026 and 2027, unless policy action is taken,” the report said.
Just 25 GW of coal projects were permitted in China in the first half of 2025, but new and revived projects came to 75 GW, the highest in a decade, and construction starts and restarts reached 46 GW, which is equivalent to the entire coal power capacity of South Korea, CREA and GEM found.
“China’s clean energy boom is driving both economic growth and decarbonisation, but continued coal expansion risks holding it back,” said Qi Qin, lead author of the report and China Analyst at CREA.
“More coal power plants would not only waste investment, but also crowd out renewables–the real engine of China’s economic future.”
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Michael Kern is a newswriter and editor at Safehaven.com and Oilprice.com.
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