China Energy/Power Technology, Strategic Layout of Resources: News & Discussions

[TaiShang]

China leads the world in new energy industry development

(People's Daily Online) 14:38, January 05, 2018

China has become a leader in the global development of new energy, owing to rapid growth of new energies, improved industrialized level, and decreased costs for generating new energies, Economic Daily reported on Jan. 5.

China’s installed generating capacity reached 1.77 billion kilowatts by 2017, among which non-fossil energy’s capacity reached 38.1 percent, up 9.6 percent since 2012, according to China’s National Energy Administration (NEA).

Renewable energies also increased remarkably, according to NEA. For example, China’s PV installed capacity saw a year-on-year increase of 65.4 percent to hit 120 million kilowatts by late September 2017.

Meanwhile, the utilization level of new energies increased. Energy generated by renewable energies amounted to 1.17 trillion kilowatts in the first three quarters of last year. Wind power, solar energy, and biomass energy rose by 26 percent, 70 percent, and 25 percent on a year-on year basis, respectively.

Also, the costs for generating energies decreased, as China is now able to produce solar photovoltaic power generation equipment itself, said Wang Bohua, secretary-general of the China Photovoltaic Industry Association.

In addition, the wind power curtailment and solar power curtailment was estimated to respectively drop by 6.7 percent and 3.8 percent in 2017 compared with the previous year thanks to favorable policies and measures, NEA said.

Sun Qiang, a director at China Three Gorges Corporation, also said that China will take advantage of its natural advantages and focus on developing offshore wind power in the future.

http://en.people.cn/n3/2018/0105/c90000-9312162.html

 

[JSCh]

"Hydrogen city" to be built in central China
Source: Xinhua| 2018-01-21 22:51:36|Editor: yan




WUHAN, Jan. 21 (Xinhua) -- Wuhan, capital city of central China's Hubei Province, will build itself into a "hydrogen city" through developing hydrogen energy industry, according to a city development plan.

The city is to advance research and development of core technology of hydrogen production, storage and transport, and improve hydrogen infrastructure in the coming years.

A hydrogen energy industrial park is expected to be built in the city, gathering more than 100 fuel cell automakers and related enterprises, the plan said.

The city will build up to 20 hydrogen fueling stations from 2018 to 2020 to support the running of about 3,000 hydrogen fuel cell-powered vehicles.

Wuhan is scheduled to become a world hydrogen city by 2025, with 3 to 5 world leading hydrogen enterprises and 30 to 100 hydrogen fueling stations. The annual production value of hydrogen fuel cells will exceed 100 billion yuan (around 15.63 billion U.S. dollars), it added.

"Despite a late start, China has made rapid progress in hydrogen development, mastering core technologies of the hydrogen fuel cell," said Zhang Qingjie, president of Wuhan University of Technology.

Wuhan, which sits on the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, is home to a number of car-making companies, including Dongfeng Motor Corporation, one of China's leading car-makers.

With China's preferential polices in hydrogen industry, Wuhan has great potential and a bright future in hydrogen energy development, Zhang said.

 

[JSCh]

China proved to be more efficient on the use of energy
Song Yingge 18:27 UTC+8, 2018-01-19

China’s use of power per unit of gross domestic product decreased 3.7 percent last year, beating the government target of cutting 3.4 percent amid upgrading of energy structure, said the National Bureau of Statistics today.

Companies nationwide have upgraded their production process to save energy, such as enhancing efficiency and adopting clean energy instead of using coal power, said Wang Yixuan, deputy director for energy statistics division at the bureau.

Over 80 percent of China’s 39 key energy-consuming industrial companies have cut energy use last year, with their steel use per unit or production losing 0.9 percent, and coal consumption per unit of production reducing 0.8 percent annually.

Across the nation, the use of clean energy -- covering natural gas, hydropower, nuclear and wind power -- increased 1.5 percentage points from a year ago, while the ratio for coal power dropped 1.7 percentage points from 2016, according to the bureau.

Meanwhile, both the domestic demand and supply of natural gas surged, bolstered by the policy of switching from coal to gas for heating. China’s generation of natural gas jumped 8.5 percent annually to 147.4 billion cubic meters in 2017, up 6.3 percentage points from a year ago.

The industrial upgrading and expansion have also boosted total electricity generation last year, with China generating 6.3 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity last year, up 5.7 percent from a year ago.

 

[JSCh]

Oil piped from Myanmar to China hits 3.9 mln tonnes in 2017
Source: Xinhua| 2018-01-26 21:13:14|Editor: Liangyu


KUNMING, Jan. 26 (Xinhua) -- The China-Myanmar crude oil pipeline carried 3.87 million tonnes of crude oil into China last year, customs authorities in southwest China's Yunnan Province said Friday.

Meanwhile, China imported 2.52 million tonnes of natural gas through a second pipeline linking the two countries, said Kunming Customs.

The value of oil and gas imports accounted for 23.4 percent of Yunnan's total imports in 2017, it said.

Crude oil started entering China via the 1,420-km China-Myanmar crude oil pipeline in mid-May of last year. The China-Myanmar natural gas pipeline was put into operation in July 2013.

The China-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline project is a state-operated collaboration between China, Myanmar and international commercial partners and built to help ensure the energy security of the world's second-largest economy.

 

[JSCh]

https://twitter.com/x/status/961080607005491200

China Xinhua News‏ @XHNews 4h4 hours ago
A new world record! The ±1100 kv Changji-Guquan UHVDC (ultra-high voltage direct current) transmission link in E China's Anhui will set a world record in terms of voltage level, transmission capacity and distance which is expected to be finished within 2018

Changji-Guquan transmission link to be finished within 2018
Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-06 21:48:25|Editor: pengying


Aerial photo taken on Feb. 6, 2018 shows the construction at the south bank of the Yangtze River of the Changji-Guquan UHVDC (ultra-high voltage direct current) transmission link in Digang Town under Fanchang County, east China's Anhui Province. The ±1100 kv Changji-Guquan transmission link will set a world record in terms of voltage level, transmission capacity and distance. The link is expected to be finished within 2018 with the installation capacity of 12,000 megawatts. (Xinhua/Guo Chen)

 

[TaiShang]

Renewable energy grows globally, especially in China: BP
Xinhua, March 3, 2018
A senior economist at BP said on Friday that rapid growth of renewables is leading to a fuel mix that could be the most diversified ever, with the largest increase in China.


Spencer Dale, group chief economist at BP, delivered report of "BP Energy Outlook 2018" at Baker Institute's Center for Energy Studies at Rice University in Houston, Texas, the United States.


According to the report, renewables development will result to a fuel mix that could be the most diversified ever through 2040.


"I have never seen such a mix," he told the audience, adding that for the past few years, the share of renewable energy has grown in the mix, especially in China and India.


Meanwhile, he said the United States has seen natural gas taking a growing share of the fuel mix.


BP produces the BP Energy Outlook annually to examine and discuss potential paths for energy demand based on assumptions about future changes in policy, technology and the economy.


The outlook stated that, in the ET scenario, the fuel mix in India in 2040 is roughly similar to that in China today.


In most cases, coal, as a source of energy, shows significant declines in the mix, except in India and some other areas in Asia.


The consumption of oil is expected to decrease in the United States, EU and China, but increase in India and some other areas in Asia. Nuclear energy is decreasing in the United States and EU, while increasing in China, India and some other areas in Asia and Middle East.


BP is a global producer of oil and gas with operations in over 70 countries. Houston is home to BP's U.S. headquarters, and it also represents the company's largest employee base in the world.

 

[JSCh]

China Powers up
Mar 13, 2018

Huge investments and cutting-edge research are helping China to pioneer innovations in clean energy technologies, reports Mark Peplow

An energy revolution is in full swing an hour’s drive from the centre of Dalian, a sprawling city in north-east China. Inside a pristine new factory on an isolated industrial estate, the world’s biggest battery is taking shape.

Source: © iStock/Getty Images ​

Keeping the lights on in Chinese cities like Dalian might soon be little more sustainable.

Out in the back lot, swaddled under blue tarpaulin sheets, are about 120 shipping containers. Each of them carries the guts of a battery capable of storing around 1MWh of energy, at least a dozen times more than a fully charged electric car. Soon, these containers will be transported along the coast to join an enormous array, which will be fed by the windfarms that dot the Dalian peninsula. By 2019, this behemoth battery will have enough containers to store an unprecedented 800MWh.

This not only dwarfs a high-profile 129MWh lithium-ion battery facility being built by electric-car maker Tesla in Jamestown, Australia. It also relies on a completely different technology: these are vanadium flow batteries (VFBs), which store and release energy through a redox see-saw of dissolved vanadium ions.

Go with the flow

The 2.9 billion yuan (￡330 million) project is one of about 30 battery installations being built across China by Rongke Power, a spin out of the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP). Business is booming thanks to a unique blend of science and policy. In September 2017, China’s economic planning agency called for a huge increase in grid-scale energy storage facilities, including VFBs, in order to flatten the peaks and troughs in supply from intermittent renewable sources. The government now requires renewable energy companies to install energy storage facilities alongside new solar or wind generating capacity.

But VFBs have also benefitted from Chinese research in chemistry and materials science, which has been crucial to improving their performance and driving down costs. ‘In vanadium flow batteries, China is leading the world,’ says Huamin Zhang of the DICP, co-founder and chief engineer at Rongke Power.

There is an oft-repeated cliché that China is much better at adopting technologies invented in other countries than it is at domestic innovation. That may once have been true, says Pierre Verlinden, chief scientist at Chinese solar energy company Trina, based in Changzhou: ‘But now it’s a myth.’


Continue reading -> China Powers up---Chinese Academy of Sciences

 

[JSCh]

CNPC Completes First Deep-Water Oil Extraction Project in Brazil
LIAO SHUMIN
DATE: TUE, 03/20/2018 - 16:35 / SOURCE:YICAI

CNPC Completes First Deep-Water Oil Extraction Project in Brazil​

(Yicai Global) March 20 -- China National Petroleum Corp. has successfully extracted some 44,000 tons of oil from Brazil’s Libra field, marking the completion of the state-owned firm’s first-ever deep-water oil project.

The Beijing-based oil giant worked with industry counterpart China National Offshore Oil Corp. to complete the extraction, with oil collected to be transferred back to China through Uruguay, reported China Petroleum Daily.

Originally contracted in December 2013, the Libra project marked the first production-sharing project for Chinese companies with the two firms holding 10 percent of rights and interests each. The project took four years to go from initial exploration to transporting the first tanker of crude.

CNPC also enlisted the help of French multinational oil and gas company Total SA to form an oil discharge research team with its own Latin American unit to overcome management and technology difficulties.

 

[JSCh]

Russian mega gas project with China going full-steam ahead
Published time: 21 Mar, 2018 09:14

© Gazprom​

Three quarters of the vast Power of Siberia natural gas pipeline to China has been completed. Over 1,629km of piping now stretches across Russian territory, according to Gazprom.

"The construction of the Power of Siberia gas pipeline is going on at a high tempo. It is a link between the gas production centers and consumers,” the company said in a statement after a meeting of its board of directors.

According to a contract signed in 2014 between Gazprom and China’s CNPC, Russia will deliver 38 billion cubic meters of gas to China annually for 30 years. The contract is worth $400 billion. Gazprom confirmed on Wednesday that deliveries will start in December 2019.

The Russian company has been building the pipeline from the gas deposit in Siberia to Russia’s Far East. At the border in Blagoveshchensk, the pipeline will be extended into China. Gas will be delivered both to Russian consumers in the Far East and to China.

Russia is pushing for second gas pipeline to China, the Power of Siberia 2. This pipeline is intended to deliver an additional 30 billion cubic meters of gas per year to Russia’s eastern partner. The countries have signed preliminary documents on the pipeline, but have not agreed prices.

© Gazprom

​

Russian mega gas project with China going full-steam ahead — RT Business News

 

[JSCh]

CNPC to build 8 gas storage facilities in SW China
Xinhua Finance in CHONGQING
2018-03-19 08:51

China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC), the country's largest oil and gas producer, plans to build eight gas storage facilities with a total capacity of 21 billion cubic meters, according to a forum that concluded on Sunday.

The gas storage facilities, located in southwest China's Sichuan Province and Chongqing Municipality, will cost more than 21 billion yuan (3.3 billion U.S. dollars), said Ma Xinhua, general manager of PetrolChina Southwest Oil and Gasfield Company, a CNPC affiliate.

The first phase of the project, to be built on the basis of two depleted gas fields, will have a capacity of 1.28 billion cubic meters, said Ma.

China has built 25 gas storage facilities with a total capacity of 11.7 billion cubic meters in the past 20 years, serving 200 million residents in 10 provincial-level regions, according to CNPC.

Currently, natural gas makes up 46.4 percent of CNPC's total oil and gas production, becoming a new growth point for the company.​

 

[TaiShang]

Gazprom confirmed on Wednesday that deliveries will start in December 2019.

Wow, I though they would not able to start deliveries by December 2019. Then, Russia will become a significant natural gas provider to China, after being top oil supplier.

This is not just economic, but geoeconomic and political.

 

[JSCh]

China to Invest USD6.4 Billion in Rural Power Grid Upgrades This Year
DOU SHICONG
DATE: FRI, 03/23/2018 - 16:00 / SOURCE:YICAI

China to Invest USD6.4 Billion in Rural Power Grid Upgrades This Year​

(Yicai Global) March 23 -- China will make total investments of CNY40.5 billion (USD6.4 billion) this year to transform and upgrade rural power grids in 26 provinces in the country’s central and western regions, with a focus on impoverished areas.

The government will provide CNY12 billion of the total investment, Xinhua News Agency reported China’s National Energy Administration Deputy Director Liu Baohua as saying.

China began to implement a new round of rural power grid transformation and upgrades in 2016 to address problems associated with the last-mile power supply in countryside areas.

Some 78,533 villages across the country have received power grid upgrades, while 33,082 poverty-stricken villages now have electric power access. The number of new motor-pumped wells has reached 1.6 million.

Some power grids in rural areas remain weak with insufficient power supply capacity, especially in impoverished areas in western China such as Tibet Autonomous Region, Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan province, Nujiang prefecture in Yunnan province, and Linxia Hui Autonomous Prefecture in Gansu province. These areas will be the focus of new efforts to transform rural power grids.

 

[JSCh]

Iceland signs major geothermal deal in China
by Janne Suokas Mar 26, 2018 13:56 INVESTMENT ENERGY RENEWABLE ENERGY

Iceland will provide a geothermal heating solution to the new Xiong'an megacity being built near Beijing. China News Service

Iceland’s Arctic Green Energy Corporation has signed a groundbreaking deal to provide a clean geothermal heating solution for a new megacity in China.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said on Thursday that it will provide US$250 million in loans to Arctic Green Energy Corporation and Sinopec Green Energy Geothermal Company Limited to expand environmentally sustainable district heating services in China.

The deal is the largest in Iceland’s history and will affect 15 million people in the Xiong’an new economic area, according to Bloomberg.

Geothermal district heating extracts thermal energy from beneath the earth’s surface for delivery to households and businesses through dedicated pipelines, offering an alternative to coal and gas that is both cheap and has zero emissions.

Iceland is the world leader in geothermal technology thanks to the high concentration of volcanoes in its area. Arctic Green Energy Corporation seeks to export the small Nordic country’s expertise in geothermal energy to growth markets in Asia.

“This is a landmark project for Asia,” said ADB Vice-President for Private Sector and Cofinancing Operations Diwakar Gupta. “Our partnership signed today in Iceland, a country whose own energy system shows the potential of geothermal, will deliver much-needed energy solutions that promote truly sustainable development.”

Sinopec Green Energy Geothermal Company Limited is a joint venture established between Arctic Green Energy Corporation and Sinopec Star of China’s state-owned oil giant Sinopec Group.

Located 100 kilometres south of Beijing in Hebei Province, Xiong’an was chosen by Chinese President Xi Jinping to be built into a new special economic zone similar to Shenzhen and Pudong in Shanghai and to relieve population pressure on Beijing.


Iceland signs major geothermal deal in China | GBTIMES.com

 

[JSCh]

Sinopec Produced 6 Billion Cubic Meters of Shale Gas Last Year at China’s First Large-Scale Field
XU WEI
DATE: TUE, 03/27/2018 - 16:34 / SOURCE:YICAI

Sinopec Produced 6 Billion Cubic Meters of Shale Gas Last Year at China’s First Large-Scale Field​

(Yicai Global) March 27 -- China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., better known as Sinopec, produced just over 6 billion cubic meters of gas at the country’s first large-scale shale gas field in 2017, located in the western Chongqing municipality.

Beijing-based Sinopec completed the project on schedule at Fuling Shale Gas Field, the world’s largest field of its kind outside North America with an annual production capacity of 10 billion cubic meters, the company’s president Dai Houliang said at an annual review of operations.

The launch of operations marks that a significant step towards the large-scale commercialization of China's shale gas industry, Dai said, adding that its development could be significant in the diversification of the country’s energy mix. The sector could alleviate supply pressure in central and eastern China’s natural gas market in the long-run, while also accelerating energy conservation, emission reduction and air pollution control.

Gas sales and production from Fuling have both exceeded 16 billion cubic meters to date, while daily sales reached up to 16.7 million cubic meters last year, meeting the basic daily gas needs of 33.4 million households per day.

Dai highlighted Fuling as a new milestone in the history of China’s energy sector, and the shale gas field can act as a guide for global shale gas development.

An interconnection between the Fuling-Wangchang Gas Pipeline and the Sichuan-East Gas Pipeline was completed in 2015. Fuling shale gas is continuously transferred through the Sichuan-East Gas Pipeline to central and eastern China to provide clean energy for areas along the Yangtze River, traditionally areas of robust economic activity. Gas supplied to the concerned areas benefits thousands of companies and more than 200 million residents in more than 70 large- and medium-sized cities spanning six provinces.

 

[JSCh]

Breakthroughs made in global energy interconnection development
Source: Xinhua| 2018-03-28 21:37:18|Editor: Mengjie


BEIJING, March 28 (Xinhua) -- Breakthroughs have been made in global energy interconnection (GEI) technology and equipment, according to an official at a global energy organization Wednesday.

Liu Zhenya, chairman of the Global Energy Interconnection Development and Cooperation Organization (GEIDCO), said the conditions for accelerating GEI development had been created, after the completion of the top-level design for GEI.

The GEIDCO has conducted in-depth studies on the economic and social development, energy resources, electricity supply and demand of over 100 countries and proposed a plan for the GEI Backbone Grid.

Supported by EHV/UHV transmission, flexible DC transmission, submarine cables, and other advanced technologies, the GEI Backbone Grid is a cluster of strategic channels that connects major large-scale clean energy bases and load centers over the whole world.

The construction of the GEI Backbone Grid will be in three stages, creating an "energy artery" that connects five continents with "nine horizontal and nine vertical" grids.

From 2018 to 2050, total investment in GEI is estimated to be about 38 trillion U.S. dollars, about 27 trillion dollars of which in power generation, and 11 trillion dollars in power grids.

Studies have shown that by 2050, about 177,000 kilometers of new transmission line will be added to the backbone grids.

Massive exploitation and use of fossil fuels have brought about severe challenges to sustainable development such as resource constraints, environment pollution, climate change and population without access to electricity.

"Clean development, ecological conservation and adjustment of energy consumption structure are fundamental solutions to the problems," said Li Yizhong, former minister for industry and information technology, at the ongoing 2018 GEI Conference in Beijing.

Take the 1100 kV UHV DC project between Kazakhstan and Germany for example: the total length of the route is 4,200 kilometers, which transmits solar power from Kazakhstan to Germany, creating a price difference of 1-2 U.S. cents per kWh compared to electricity generated by the North Sea Wind Power Hub.

Liu proposed that consensus between governments, companies and all sectors of society should be built to synergize GEI with the Paris Agreement, the Belt and Road Initiative and regional development strategies.

He said efforts should be made to speed up breakthroughs in key technologies and equipment such as UHV large-capacity submarine cables, UHV VSC-HVDC and high-efficient clean power generation technologies.

The studies estimated that by 2050, clean energy will generate more than 81 percent of the total amount of electricity globally, add 0.2 percent annual growth to the world economy, lower the cost of electricity by 2.8 U.S. cents per kWh compared to the current price, and create a total of over 100 million jobs.

The 2018 GEI Conference, themed "GEI from China's Initiative to Global Action", is being held from March 28 to 29 in Beijing. Over 800 participants from more than 30 countries and regions have gathered here to discuss the development of GEI.

As the world's biggest energy consumer and fastest growing non-fossil fuel market, China is pushing for GEI. The plan, proposed nearly two years ago, is expected to contribute to the revival of ancient trade routes.