The National Energy Administration encourages the use of renewable energy as one of the important sources of heating particularly in rural areas of China • The Clean Heating Industry Committee recently released the China Clean Heating Industry Development Report 2020, detailing the Northern China heating landscape including opportunities and challenges • Six Chinese state-owned utilities and infrastructure companies has issued the nation’s first batch of carbon-neutral bonds • Read more about sustainable heating and cooling developments in China in the February news update
National Energy Administration encourages the use of renewable energy as one of the important sources of heating particularly in the rural area of the country. The Administration issued a circular in late January 2021 to promote renewable energy as heating resources to improve energy structure, realize energy savings and reduce emissions.
Local governments are required set specific targets based on local conditions and establish a heating system that combines renewable energy with other heating methods. As of the end of 2019, only 3% of the heating source in northern China is from renewable energy.
See more information on the Chinese government website
“China Clean Heating Industry Development Report 2020” was recently released by the Clean Heating Industry Committee, CHIC. According to the report, by the end of 2019, the total heating area in northern China was 21.1 billion square meters. Among which, the urban heating area is 14.1 billion square meters, and the rural heating area is 7 billion square meters. The clean heating area is 11.6 billion square meters, and the clean heating rate is 55%. 8,200 companies conduct clean heating related business.
The “coal-to-gas” and “coal-to-electricity” clean heating strategy has been adopted with aim to reduce dispersed coal consumption and related air pollution during the heating season. There are some challenges for clean heating, such as high pressure on financial subsidy, slow return on investment by enterprise etc. The report promotes to use industrial waste heat, geothermal energy, sewage / river water source heat pumps, wind energy and renewable energy for heating.
A condensed version of the report can be downloaded here
Six Chinese state-owned utilities and infrastructure companies issued the nation’s first batch of carbon-neutral bonds with a total value of 6.4 billion yuan ($992 million) in February, 2021 to finance clean energy and low-carbon projects.
The bond issuers are:
Proceeds from the borrowings will be used to fund green projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The projects mainly include photovoltaics, wind power, hydropower, and green buildings.
State Grid is the world’s largest utility company and is the first state-owned enterprise to unveil their carbon neutrality plan in China. State Grid published their carbon neutrality plan on Monday March 1st, 2021. In the plan, State Grid aims to maximize the buildout of wind and solar energy infrastructure across the country.
State Grid will “build a diversified clean energy supply system” in the next five to ten years, according to the action plan. By 2025, the proportion of primary energy consumption in China that does not use fossil fuels will reach 20%, according to State Grid’s estimate. By 2030, it expects that consumption to reach 25%.
On the energy consumption side, State Grid will focus on the promotion of electric energy to replace coal and fossil fuels in industrial manufacturing, construction, and transport. By 2025, State Grid expects the proportion of electricity in final energy consumption to reach 30%. State Grid will actively promote clean heating by “coal-to-electricity” approach.
For more information please visit State Grid’s website
Shanghai will accelerate the building of five “new cities” in its suburbs to optimize its development layout and boost economic growth in the next five years. According to the city’s 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) and Long-term Vision for 2035, which was approved by the municipal people’s congress, the government will support the building of major industrial projects, high-quality public infrastructure and comprehensive transportation hubs in the five new cities.
By 2025, the five new cities — Jiading, Qingpu, Songjiang, Fengxian and Nanhui — will attract 3.6 million permanent residents. According to the plan, newly built civil buildings shall strictly implement green building standards.
For more information please visit the Shanghai Municipality website
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