CHINA
In the early 1990’s China drew up its Agenda 21 Program,
which defined a strategy to lead the country on a
sustainable development path in the 21st century.
One section of Agenda 21 dealt with renewable energies
under the heading of "Sustainable Energy Production
and Consumption". In addition to providing detailed
resource estimates this section also dealt with specific
development objectives and activities required to
achieve them. It had been estimated that Chinese wind
power resources are some 3 200 GW of which about 10%
is exploitable. The areas with greatest wind energy
potential are the provinces and autonomous regions
of Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Heliongjiang, Gansu,
Jilin, Hebei, Liaoning, Shandong, Jiangxi, Jiangsu,
Guangdong, Zhejiang, Fujian and Hainan. Most other
provinces have recourse to isolated wind resources.
Despite the Government’s stated goal of 1 000 MW of
installed wind power by 2000 (and 3 000 MW by 2010),
only 25 MW capacity was added during 1999, bringing
the end-year figure to 253 MW. The slow deployment
of wind turbines has been in part due to the Chinese
insistence on bilateral donor support for projects
- the projects have therefore been small.
In 1995 the US Department of Energy (DOE) and the
Chinese Government signed a Protocol for Cooperation
in the Fields of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
Development and Utilisation. Furthermore, in late-1996,
Annex II to the Protocol was signed. The objective
of Annex II is to promote the sustainable, large-scale
deployment of wind energy systems for both grid-connected
and off-grid village power applications in China.
Twelve provincial and autonomous power corporations
are engaged in developing wind power and 19 wind farms
have been established in two high-wind zones. The
64 MW Xinjiang Dabancheng wind farm is China’s largest
and the 42 MW Guangdong Nanao wind farm is the largest
island-based installation in Asia.
In addition to large wind power plants (typically
20-100 MW) for connection to the national grid, it
is planned to install clusters of small wind turbines
(10-100 kW) in townships and villages for rural electrification
and also on a very small scale (0.5-10 kW) in individual
homes to provide electricity for domestic uses.
COUNTRY NOTES
(WIND ENERGY)
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