China makes notable progress in green, low-carbon energy transition: white paper

BEIJING - China has made notable progress in green and low-carbon energy transition as a result of its vigorous measures to substitute renewables for fossil fuels and promote a new energy and power system, a white paper has said.

The white paper, titled "Carbon Peaking and Carbon Neutrality China's Plans and Solutions" and released Saturday by China's State Council Information Office, said China has achieved new energy development on the largest scale and at the fastest speed in the world, with the percentage of non-fossil energy consumption increasing from 16.0 percent in 2020 to 19.8 percent in 2024.

By the end of August 2025, the installed capacity of wind and photovoltaic power had surpassed 1,690 GW, triple that of 2020 and accounting for about 80 percent of the newly installed power generation capacity since 2020; meanwhile, the regular installed hydropower capacity in China stood at around 380 GW, and that of pumped-storage hydropower stations at about 62.37 GW, according to the document.

By the end of August 2025, China had 112 nuclear power units in operation, under construction, or approved for construction, with a combined installed capacity of 125 GW, ranking first globally; meanwhile, the installed capacity of biomass power generation had reached 46.88 GW.

By the end of 2024, China led the world in the annual production capacity of green hydrogen energy at over 150,000 tonnes, the document said.

China has also accelerated clean and efficient utilization of fossil energy and made efforts to strengthen the regulation capacity of the power system by improving its reliability and resilience as part of efforts to achieve the goals of reaching peak carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and carbon neutrality before 2060.

As the year 2025 marks the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement, this white paper was published to present a comprehensive overview of China's major achievements in pursuing peak carbon and carbon neutrality over the past five years, and to share China's approaches, actions, and experience, according to the State Council Information Office.