China to roll out new five-year plan for energy sector

A wind farm under construction in Chuzhou, Anhui province. [Photo/China Daily]

The 13th Five-Year Plan for the energy industry has been drafted and is expected to debut in the first six months of this year, the Economic Information Daily reported on Monday, citing a senior official from the National Energy Administration.

"We will soon seek advice on the draft blueprint of the energy sector for the next five years and submit it to the State Council afterwards," said He Yongjian, deputy director of the NEA's Development and Planning Department. "The plan is expected to roll out in the first half of this year."

He said future energy development will focus more on quality and efficiency, as severe excess capacity in certain traditional energy has been weighing on the ongoing economic restructuring.

Cutting overcapacity will be the top priority in the next five years, he said. "New projects will not be allowed to launch for at least three years to explore traditional energy with huge overcapacity, such as coal, thermal power, oil refining and chemicals."

According to the newspaper, energy demand by 2020 is projected to reach 4.85 billion tons of standard coal, which will come from 4.05 billion tons of coal, 590 million tons of petroleum, 350 billion cubic meters of natural gas and 750 million tons of non-fossil energy in standard coal.

"We are faced with quite a few challenges, except for overcapacity in energy structural reforms. The current electric power system needs to jack up the capacity to meet the peaks in power demand and to tap on renewable energy resources," He said.

Curtailments continue to impede development of renewable energy, including wind, water, and light, though "it's acceptable to keep the wind curtailment rate within 5 percent", he said. "In principle, areas where curtailment rates exceed the reasonable level will not launch new projects as well in the next five years."

China is beefing up efforts to cut reliance on traditional energy resources, and tap clean and renewable energy - especially wind power, hydropower, solar and nuclear power - to balance the current structure during the 13th Five-Year Plan period, the newspaper said.