| Abstract |
China could lead the world in wind energy development and play a larger role in combating climate change, according to a report by the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC), Greenpeace and Chinese Renewable Energy Industry Association (CREIA). The China Wind Power Report 2007 predicts that China’s installed wind power capacity could reach 122 GW by 2020, equivalent to the capacity of five Three Gorges Dams. China’s current target for wind energy is 30GW by 2020. The report urges China to set a more ambitious target in order to seize the opportunity of massive uptake of wind power, and gives three different growth projections for the Chinese wind market. Given current policies, China’s installed capacity of wind energy could reach 50GW by 2020, accounting for about 4% of the total installed generation capacity. If the policy environment could be further improved, the installed capacity of wind energy could reach 80GW by 2020, accounting for 7% of installed capacity. However, if the Chinese government could give full policy support to wind power, then the installed capacity of wind energy could exceed 120GW by 2020, accounting for up to 10% of the total installed capacity of the country. |
