Renewable energy law amended

Article in The Wall Street Journal (Dec 28)

Chinese Law Aims to Increase the Use of Renewable Energy

"China announced new regulations to increase the use of renewable energy such as wind and hydropower by forcing electricity-grid operators to prioritize their use...

The new measures were passed Saturday by the standing committee of the National People's Congress, China's legislature, as an amendment to the 2006 renewable-energy law. The amendment will force powerful state-owned electric grid companies, responsible for distributing electricity from power plants, to buy all the electricity generated from renewable sources even when it is more expensive and more complicated to use than electricity from coal-fired plants."

Coal currently accounts for 70% of China's total energy use. China wants to increase use of renewable-energy sources to 15% of its total by 2020, up from 9% last year.

The government's efforts have encouraged a boom in renewable-energy development in China that has added more generation capacity than China's electricity grid has been using. That has left between a quarter and a third of China's wind farms stranded."