Citizens seek gains from self-generated electricity

BEIJING - Dong Qiang stands proudly looking up at the solar panel installed on the roof of his house.

The engineer is one of a growing number of Chinese citizens that are generating their own electricity and looking to sell what they do not need or use.

Dong was amazed at the smooth process, including applying for permission to set up a self-generating power unit, installing the facilities, generating the power and then being able to sell any extra to a local electricity power company.

Living in coastal Tianjin municipality, Dong, spent 60,000 yuan ($9,678) on the electricity generating apparatus, including a set of three-kilowatt solar panels and 1.5-kilowatt wind power electricity-generating products.

"The apparatus can generate 15 kilowatt-hours of electricity per day, while the family only use about 7 kWh," said Dong, "We plan to use half of the clean energy and sell the rest to the local electricity company."

Dong is not alone.

Xu Pengfei, living in the eastern coastal city of Qingdao in Shandong province, started the country's first "family generating station" with an installed capacity of two kilowatts, which generates 2,600 kWh of electricity each year.

Zhu Jianbing in Pingxiang city of East China's Jiangxi province installed a four-kilowatt solar panel on his roof at a cost of 38,000 yuan, and the generated electricity has already been integrated into the state grid.

In February, the State Grid Corporation published an outline that said the grid will provide convenient entrance for the integration of distributed generation, which is when electricity is generated from small energy sources.

Xing Ligong, an official with Tianjin branch of the State Grid Cooperation, said that improved technology could help implement self-generation and its integration to the grid.

"Except for the assurance of maintenance and stability, domestic technology would be enough to operate self-generation," Xing added.

Many industry experts look forward to the development of clean energy, but only a small group of Chinese people have tried to install distributed generation facilities.

Xiao Han, a researcher in new energy with China Investment Consulting, a leading professional consultive institution in industry research, said that distributed generation makes greater use of clean energy.

"Distributed generation is located much closer to households with flexible integration, and collects energy from many sources including solar power, biomass energy, wind energy source and terrestrial heat," Xiao said.

It also has less environmental impact and stimulates the enthusiasm of new energy developers, compared to large centralized facilities, which depend on the use of fossil fuel, nuclear, large solar power facilities or hydropower plants, Xiao added.

According to the figure provided by Saidi Consulting, a research company under China Center for Information Industry Development, on Taobao, a major online shopping site, sales of solar energy products in March grew 1.6 times than that in February.

Wang Yong, a manager at Saidi, said that the policies of distributed generation as well as integration into the grid is good news for new-energy companies.

However, experts are concerned over the prospect in promoting distributed generation in the short term, as people who are keen on developing self-generation are mainly science lovers.

Industry expert Wang Nengyuan also voiced worries about sustainable development for citizens to generate electricity without a feasible profit model.