Critical power sector issues in China’s 13th Five-Year period

On October 26, the Brookings-Tsinghua Center for Public Policy and Beijing Energy Network co-hosted a seminar on critical power sector issues in China’s 13th Five-Year period. Against a backdrop of China’s oversupply of power, the seminar aims to discuss three critical and intertwined issues facing China in the 13th Five-Year period—including goals of electric power planning, development and prospect of coal power, and renewable power integration and their inner mechanisms. Several factors, including conventional thinking, systemic inertia, sectoral interests, and uncertainty in electric power demand growth, could hinder goal setting and consensus achievement of power planning in the 13th Five-Year Plan. Meanwhile, though coal power remains the main concern, the unprecedented construction scale and unpredictable economic growth have made the decisionmaking process extremely complicated.

Looking at the growth trends in power demand from the long-term perspectives of economic growth, Jiahai Yuan from North China Electric Power University explored China’s current power oversupply situations, applying the sector-based structural scenario analysis model. He then discussed the goals of electric power planning in the 13th Five-Year Plan, with a focus on the necessity and feasibility of peaking the coal power installment capacity at 920 million kilowatts. Yuan also touched upon the economic costs of unlimited installment and its relation with renewable power integration, with an emphasis on key issues and challenges in renewable power integration in the 13th Five-Year period.

Above: Yuan Jiahai giving presentation

Above: Panel Discussion