Focus on Arts and Ecology

Despite uncertainties, Chinese wind companies are making headway including a plan to build the UK's largest turbine plant. 

By Niu Yuhan, March 2, 2026

In August 2025, a German offshore wind project in the North Sea decided to cancel a deal to buy turbines from Chinese wind power giant Mingyang. A year after the agreement had been signed, developer Luxcara chose instead to buy from German firm Siemens Gamesa.

The official statement from Luxcara described it as a commercial decision but some in the media have pinned it on “political resistance” to Chinese wind manufacturers.

Mingyang found another foothold, this time in the UK, when it signed a strategic partnership with UK energy generator and supplier Octopus a month later. The two parties plan to use Octopus software and Mingyang turbines to develop up to 6 GW of onshore wind.

Qin Haiyan, secretary-general of the Chinese Wind Energy Association, says Chinese wind firms are treated differently to their European rivals depending on a country’s industrial policy, security concerns and geopolitical alignment – and warned they must be fully prepared for those risks. “Firms should be proactive in using legal and lobbying tools to advocate for their interests within the local legal and political frameworks,” he told Dialogue Earth.

Anders Hove, a senior research fellow at think-tank the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, told Dialogue Earth there haven’t been clear signals on whether European countries will buy Chinese offshore turbines. This means European project owners need to communicate with their governments and make their own decisions.

Future governments, he emphasised, may drop support for approved projects. Given the long project lifecycles in Europe, political stability, or lack thereof, is particularly important. Even so, Chinese firms are looking to take advantage of the European market’s strong long-term potential.

Chinese wind power blows in

China’s wind power sector is a global leader, accounting for almost 80 gigawatts (GW), or about 70% of the 109 GW of new onshore wind power installed in 2024, according to a report from the Global Wind Energy Council.

Chinese companies led the global wind turbine manufacturing market in 2024, with Goldwind, Envision and Mingyang for the first time taking all three top spots, found a report from consultancy Wood Mackenzie.

This is largely due to robust domestic demand. Outside of China, European wind turbine makers such as Vestas, Siemens Gamesa and Nordex still lead almost everywhere.

But as competition at home intensifies and more manufacturing capacity comes online, the Chinese firms are shifting to selling overseas. China’s wind power exports grew more than 70% year-on-year in 2024, with 26.1 GW of overseas orders won, customs data shows. At the end of the first half of 2025 that figure already stood at 19.5 GW.

This international expansion is concentrated in emerging markets. Figures from Rystad Energy show that since 2020 Chinese manufacturers have increased their share of orders from Central Asia, the Middle East, Africa and South America from less than 30% to over 50%.

Those are mostly onshore wind orders. However, China builds the world’s biggest offshore wind turbines, and has a complete supply chain and large-scale manufacturing capacity. In other words, it has the industrial base needed for an attempt on the European market.

Europe’s wind power concerns

Local firms have long dominated the European market, with a market share of 85% of wind power equipment in use on the continent, rising to 94% for offshore wind, according to a 2024 EU policy briefing.

The EU has set a target of 42.5% renewables in the energy mix by 2030. Industry association WindEurope estimates this will require 425 GW of wind power capacity, with 86-89 GW of that to come from offshore wind. While the UK, which had 15.9 GW of offshore wind in 2024, is aiming for 43-50 GW by 2030.

But slow rollout is a major obstacle to Europe realising its ambitious goals.

WindEurope calculated the EU needed to install an annual average of 36 GW of wind power from 2025 to 2030 to hit its goals. In 2024, it realised only 12.9 GW. At current speeds, WindEurope estimates the EU will be able to build about 23 GW of wind power each year over the next five years.

According to the group’s analysis, Europe is not building enough wind farms due to slow and complicated permitting processes, a lack of grid capacity and slow electrification. The latter means the shift from burning fossil fuels to using electricity to fuel cars, central heating and other tech. As an example, a 1 GW offshore wind farm in Germany completed in the first half of 2025 won’t be connected to the national grid until this year.

According to Anders Hove, while many blame particular countries or policy bottlenecks, the bigger problem is long-term uncertainties eroding industry confidence. “There are lots of variables, which means the industry can’t predict annual demand. What the slow pace of installation reflects is those systemic uncertainties, rather than any particular national issues,” he says.

He says that post-pandemic inflation, especially the rising cost of materials and labour, has stopped many companies from bidding for contracts. More importantly, some European governments have had unrealistic cost expectations for offshore wind, which is more sensitive to financing and material costs than onshore. This has led to national capacity auctions failing to attract bids, or to them being delayed or redesigned.

Where Chinese manufacturers are seeing a steadily growing domestic market, European players are struggling with low demand. “If your customers aren’t buying this year or next, you can’t expand, nor can you gain practical experience and work out how to cut costs,” says Hove. “Inadequate demand leaves the entire supply chain sitting idle.”

The low-cost myth

Chinese turbines tend to be less expensive than European ones, and the gap is particularly apparent in offshore wind.

In 2024, offshore wind power cost USD 3,389 per kilowatt in Europe, more than twice the USD 1,520 cost in China, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency.

This isn’t just down to government subsidies and economies of scale but also Chinese innovation.

Chinese companies are leading the world in offshore turbines, manufacturing longer blades and taller towers. Dongfang started testing a 26 MW turbine in late 2025 and Mingyang has announced a 50 MW dual-rotor design concept that features two 25 MW modules on a V-shaped tower. Meanwhile, European manufacturers are focused on machines around 15 MW.

Chinese wind power projects may cost less to develop domestically, but these advantages necessarily translate directly to overseas markets. According to data from BloombergNEF, Chinese wind power turbines sell overseas for 20% less than the US or European equivalents, and turbine costs account for 30-43% of offshore wind project costs. But Hove points out that in European projects there are a lot of hidden costs besides the turbines.

A report co-authored by Hove says larger projects and turbines are helping to reduce the cost of offshore wind in Europe, but making everything bigger has broader consequences. One of these is for shipping costs, which increase. The shipping industry, meanwhile, is having to decarbonise, which will further increase the cost of long-distance transport, the report finds.

Financing costs are also a key variable. According to the report, banks can impose higher rates of interest, stricter covenants, or extra warranty bonds on projects using Chinese equipment, offsetting some of the capital cost advantages.

Localising manufacture

In response to these challenges, some Chinese companies are planning to set up factories in Europe. Mingyang, for example, announced it would build the UK’s biggest turbine factory in Scotland. The GBP 1.5 billion project would create 1,500 jobs, according to Mingyang, and is expected to be in operation by the end of 2028. The idea is to make the towers and blades locally while transporting the gearboxes and bearings, which are easier to ship, from China. This would reduce shipping costs and help meets Europe’s preference for localisation.

Qin Haiyan says such “hybrid supply chains” are essential if Chinese companies are to shift from being product exporters to overseas manufacturers. Deeper cooperation with local developers and industrial chains will allow Chinese companies to make full use of local resources such as talent, capital, technology, and increase European manufacturing capacity, all of which will increase overall project efficiency, he says. But it remains to be seen if competitiveness can be maintained, and local jobs created, when working in a higher-cost environment.

The project has not yet been finalised. Although Mingyang has identified the Port of Ardersier as its preferred site and has held discussions with the UK and Scottish governments for several years, details such as the scale of investment, construction plans and final approval are subject to confirmation. Debates in the UK over energy security, scrutiny of Chinese investment and broader geopolitical concerns have added further uncertainty.

Hove warns that while Europe wants to encourage localisation of manufacturing, China manufactures 70% of the global supply of key components like gearboxes, turbine blades and castings. These “European-made” turbines will still, in large part, rely on Chinese supply chains.

Working with China

To ease supply chain bottlenecks and cost pressures, some European firms have started looking at carefully delimited cooperation with Chinese manufacturers.

Hove gave Mingyang’s partnership with the UK’s Octopus as an example. Octopus will have control of the software and management system, with the Chinese party just supplying the turbines.

Octopus didn’t comment on the project specifics but told Dialogue Earth by email it is in conversation with Mingyang on how to roll out hardware to speed up the UK energy transition and bring down costs for bill payers. From Mingyang, Dialogue Earth received no response following its request for comment.

He points out that Europe’s concerns over Chinese equipment are often more about reputational risks than actual technology or security concerns.

So far, very few wind farms in Europe, offshore or onshore, are using turbines sourced from Chinese manufacturers. China-made turbines are still being evaluated and tested.

Qin Haiyan says escalating commercial competition into trade protectionism will only increase wind project costs and slow rollout – ultimately reducing what countries can do to respond to climate change. Multiple studies have shown that protectionism could slow expansion of the wind market, increase costs, and reduce its long-term financial sustainability.

Hove says that while there is not yet any large-scale China-Europe cooperation, even the presence of competitors would be enough to shake the European market out of deadlock. “Just the possibility of Chinese firms getting involved, that potential competition, has already done a great deal to invigorate the supply chains,” he says.

Experts say the effort to discover drugs found within ocean organisms must proceed hand in hand with conservation. 

By Feng Yingxin, March 4, 2026

In the vastness of the ocean lie many unique organisms, genes and molecules. They offer huge potential for new medicines to fight disease but the pipeline for their development is nascent.

Most drugs on the market originate from terrestrial sources. But the companies working to derive drugs from marine animals and plants were paying attention in January, when an agreement to manage biodiversity in waters beyond national jurisdiction came into effect: the high seas treaty.  

A basic tenet of this treaty, also known as the Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction agreement, is that the benefits of drugs derived from marine genetic resources should be fairly shared among nations. This would include using the proceeds generated by these drugs to fund the conservation – and sustainable use – of ocean life.

In China, a member state of the treaty, scientists are on the quest to find cures in the ocean following a government push. Dialogue Earth talked to experts about the country’s progress on marine-derived drug discovery and how it interacts with ocean protection.

Huge potential, limited results

More than 40 research projects to discover new marine drugs have been set up in China. Industry clusters have started to form in the coastal areas of Shandong, Guangdong and Jiangsu. Local governments there regard pharmaceuticals as a growth point for the marine economy during China’s 15th Five Year Plan period (2026-2030).

In 2024, added value from marine pharmaceuticals and “bioproducts” – meaning mostly medical and health products and supplements – reached CNY 78 billion (USD 11 billion), according to government statistics. That was up 1.9% on the previous year.

Marine organisms, such as sponges, corals and algae, show such promise for pharmaceutical discoveries because they often live in extreme environments: cold, saline, dark, high pressure. Over millions of years, many have evolved complex and unique chemical structures that are not found on land.

These structures allow the organisms to produce bioactive compounds to survive, deter predators and even communicate with each other. These compounds display antimicrobial, anticancer, anti-inflammatory and antiviral properties, making them promising sources for groundbreaking drugs.

Geng Lihua has been working on marine pharmaceuticals for over a decade. She is now an associate researcher working on algae-derived drugs at the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Oceanology.

Geng tells Dialogue Earth that China has a long recorded history of using marine drugs, dating back to the Qin dynasty (221-206 BCE). But the sources of those drugs prevail into the present day – kelp, cuttlefish, clams.

As of 2022, scientists around the world have uncovered at least 18 pharmaceuticals that now help patients to fight cancer, relieve pain, combat viral infection and manage cardiovascular conditions or other diseases. For example, propylene glycol alginate sodium sulphate (PSS) was developed by Chinese scientists in the 1970s. It originates in Antarctic brown seaweed and is used to treat cardiovascular diseases, mainly in China.

Meanwhile, the haikun shenxi capsule was approved for clinical use in 2003. Developed at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing by a team led by the scientist Xu Zuhong, this kelp-derived traditional Chinese medicine formula treats renal failure.

Since the breakthrough of PSS, very few new marine drugs have been certified by China’s State Drug Administration. Recent years have seen a number of algae-derived drugs enter clinical testing in China, including BG136, a cancer drug, and TGC161, which can fight the sexually transmitted infection HPV.

Why is it so slow and challenging?

A drug’s journey from initial identification to final product is a long and expensive one.

Marine organisms must be obtained and synthesised in a lab at scale, then a candidate drug identified and subjected to three stages of clinical testing.

It takes 10 to 15 years to bring a terrestrial-source drug to market, one industry worker in China, who preferred to remain anonymous, tells Dialogue Earth. They say the processes for marine drugs are much longer and pricier.

There are also complex approvals processes before a drug can be sold in China, and reapproval is required after four to 10 years. Selling on international markets requires another round of compliance checks and further clinical data to meet international standards.

The challenges can be illustrated by GV971, another seaweed-derived drug, this time intended to treat Alzheimer’s disease. Chinese scientists worked with Shanghai Green Valley Pharma to develop GV971. The company went through an international registration process and was keen to find export opportunities.

However, the clinical research and efficacy were called into question by scientists both in China and overseas. In 2022, the company halted overseas clinical trials, citing a lack of funds and the impact of the pandemic. In 2025, it failed a domestic re-approval process and production halted.

Understanding the oceans

Geng Lihua says current policy is focused on developing more drugs, but our understanding of the ocean and its complex chemical compounds remains far from adequate to optimise this process.

Geng focuses on the upstream development of polysaccharide drugs, derived from algae.

Polysaccharides are huge and complex molecules, representing a potential reservoir of new drugs that could be used to treat cancer, inflammation and metabolic diseases, she says. “But in China and even globally, research into polysaccharides is moving slowly.”

We still do not know enough about the structure of polysaccharides and how to synthesise them, she adds.

Although developing drugs from polysaccharides does not require a full understanding of their structure, a lack of knowledge is hampering key stages. These include improving the structures to make them more suitable as medicines, and scaling up synthesis.

What about the ecosystems?

The European Union, the US, India and Japan are also making efforts to develop marine pharmaceuticals. But at the same time, international society has become more concerned about how organisms are surveyed and used, and about sharing the benefits of marine genetic resources equitably. Planning for that fairer use, and ensuring sustainability, is a focus of international talks on the ocean.

“The identification of marine chemicals and drugs has only minor impacts on the environment,” says Geng Lihua.

She says researchers extract substances from microorganisms or plants and then study their structure and potency. Little actual material is needed. And if a useful product is identified, it is produced by synthesis or genetic engineering, rather than extracted directly from plants or animals.

Currently, samples for drug development are most commonly taken from coastal ecosystems. But as technology improves, scientists are turning to more distant and deeper environments, such as the vulnerable ecosystems surrounding hydrothermal vents. Experts worry these will be harmed by surveying and sampling, and that conflict over resources may arise.

Erik Zhivkoplias, a researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre in Sweden, says as we begin to use these habitats’ genetic resources, we must invest in understanding how to protect the species that live there. In other words, we need to ensure that our understanding keeps pace with our impact. “The ocean has proven its value as a reservoir of innovation,” he says. “But if ecosystem functions are degraded, we risk losing that ‘innovation box’ entirely over the long term.”

Zhou Haichao, a researcher at China’s Shenzhen University, focuses on the conservation and sustainable use of mangroves, including drug discoveries in these ecosystems. He says he hopes the profits generated through science-based, rational use of marine resources can be directed to conservation efforts. For example, revenues could be used to create more employment opportunities for local communities, or to expand mangrove conservation initiatives.

“Commercial capital can easily lead to unchecked profit-seeking. Therefore, cautious government management is necessary,” he adds.

Who profits?

When the high seas treaty came into force last month, it set down a clearer framework for countries to work to. Over 80 countries, including China and Japan, have ratified the treaty.

As habitats and resources on the high seas do not belong to any one country, there was a governance blind spot prior to the treaty coming into force. Who should the profits made from those resources accrue to?

Erik Zhivkoplias says that, alongside requiring environmental impact assessments, the treaty makes it clear the benefits should be shared globally.

Those rules ensure “the global commons serve humanity rather than only those nations with advanced scientific and technological capacities.”

Zhou agrees that countries with the necessary technology should share knowledge, capabilities and benefits with the local communities where marine resources are found.

China has actively participated in international conventions with an open mind, says Zhou, but “current international standards are mostly dominated by the US and European countries.”

“China could also begin proposing standards better suited to its own circumstances and those of other Asian countries, potentially becoming a new force in marine conservation and development,” he adds.

Feng Yingxin

The changing climate is a major factor in the global increase of chronic inflammatory diseases, as examples in China are showing. 

By Gus Rick, March 10, 2026

In 2024, Yang Xuehong hired an air conditioner technician and advertised their services for free in Zhuhai, a rapidly growing coastal city near Hong Kong.

Armed with a questionnaire on climate risks, she then accompanied them house to house, conducting informal interviews with residents as the technician worked. People kept telling Yang that their arthritis would flare up during stormy weather.

She had encountered in her own community a symptom of climate change showing up all around the world.

“We don’t stick too rigidly to the questionnaire,” explains Yang, founder of the Zhuhai Root, Stem and Leaf Environmental Protection Promotion Centre. “We just go with the flow of the conversation.”

Her small non-profit had initially focussed on promoting low-carbon lifestyle. But in 2024 it started to focus on local adaptation to the changing climate. Arthritis initially struck Yang as a mobility concern. Could residents evacuate if a typhoon made it necessary? But she soon learned it was a broader, quality-of-life issue too.

She requested diagnostic records from the community health station and they revealed a significant upward trend in hospital visits for arthritis since 2020, the year the archive begins. Yang’s team started to classify arthritis as a “climate-sensitive condition”.

Community members, she found, were unlikely to draw the connection between their pain and a global issue like climate change. “They know rain triggers their pain. They know this pain is linked to weather changes.” But, she says, they rarely asked bigger questions like: “Why is the climate changing? How does this relate to me? What changes will it bring to my life? To my body?”

Asking such questions is an important step for communities to understand climate change, Yang believes.

Climate change is amplifying non-infectious diseases

Answering them is not simple. Recent research has revealed profound links between the health of people and our environment under the stress of climate change. Though its role in the spread of infectious diseases is widely recognised, studies are also tying it to non-infectious inflammatory disorders like arthritis.

One found a 14% global increase in arthritis between 1990 and 2020, listing climate change alongside diet and stress as major factors.  

A number of meta-analyses and review articles over the past few years have also found climate change involved in the growing prevalence of allergic diseases and immune-mediated diseases such as asthma. The work has been done by multinational teams of health scientists collating research from around the world.

Well aligned on the solutions the research suggests, they consistently call for cutting of fossil fuel emissions and provision of stronger funding for climate adaptation, especially in the Global South.

Arthritis is among a number of chronic inflammatory disorders “increasing in parallel at an epidemic rate”, says Ioana Agache, a professor of allergy and clinical immunology at Transylvania University in Brasov, Romania.

Also on the rise are allergies, asthma, allergic rhinitis, metabolic disorders like diabetes and obesity, chronic inflammatory bowel diseases, neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s, mental health disorders and cancers, she says.

Agache told Dialogue Earth that these conditions are all associated with a number of common factors: systemic microinflammation; a dysregulated immune-system response and microbiome; and defects in the function of our skin, gut, nose or lungs – which together form the transmissible barrier between our bodies and our environments.

Researchers have identified a second “major wave” of chronic inflammatory disorders, starting in the 2000s, says Agache. This coincides with increased “climate-change-derived aggressors” such as extreme weather events and wildfires. It also correlates with new pathogens and the increasing presence of microplastics and nanoparticles, Agache adds.

The first wave had been identified in the 1970s, says Agache, coinciding with the introduction of certain cleaning agents, outdoor pollution, fast foods and cosmetics with certain additives.

Climate action plans fail to address the latest research

Last November, several civil society health networks attended the COP30 climate conference in Brazil. Representing health organisations from different countries, they called for lower emissions and more funding for climate adaptation, especially in the Global South, where climate impacts are more intense and countries have fewer resources to adapt. But the conference had no dedicated negotiation track for health issues.

The body which runs climate COPs, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), does however require countries to consider health impacts when preparing the national adaptation plans they submit to it.

Meanwhile the UNFCCC and World Health Organization (WHO), with whom the UNFCCC has increasingly partnered over the last several years, both encourage countries to voluntarily develop health national adaptation plans.

By May 2025, only 27 countries had made such plans, according to a WHO analysis. And of the 59 that had submitted national adaptation plans, “noncommunicable diseases” were among the two “least mentioned risks”, demonstrating less focus in adaptation planning. The most frequently mentioned risks were extreme weather events, and vector- and water-borne diseases.

“Prioritising mitigation and adaptation measures for noncommunicable diseases is a huge unmet need,” says Agache.

China as a case study

In China, the 2025 Lancet Countdown Report found that funding gaps significantly impacted local execution of health-adaptation planning: 77% of provinces reported a lack of multisectoral coordination; 67% cited insufficient funding; and 53% faced gaps in surveillance systems and risk-assessment technologies, such as weather monitors or tools to analyse weather data.

Overall, China’s adaptation planning would benefit from “upstream” strategies, said Lu Hui, deputy chief physician of a public hospital in Guangdong province, during a public talk. Such strategies would create preventative, systemic interventions that address the source of health impacts. They could include public health education to reduce vulnerable populations’ exposure to heatwaves, rather than treating their “downstream” consequences.

Lu discussed interventions as simple as communicating with elderly people that they are more likely to get heatstroke if they don’t use air conditioning in summer, even if they haven’t needed it before. A focus on responding to the “downstream” impacts often results in “half the result with twice the effort”, according to Lu.

China’s National Climate Adaptation Strategy 2035 gestures towards the importance of addressing these challenges. It outlines the need to improve analysis and assessment of “the complexity, wide scope, and far-reaching nature of direct and indirect threats of climate change to natural ecosystems and socio-economic systems”, as well as to incorporate climate adaptation at the local level.

The National Climate Health Adaptation Plan (2024-2030) also lists “proactive adaptation” as a priority, which suggests a need for the “upstream” strategies mentioned by Lu.

Around China, local groups like Yang’s are increasingly addressing the impacts of climate change on their communities. Yang says she corresponds regularly with other researchers. And the questionnaire she created was based off an IPCC climate risk framework and community-led response materials. But issues like noncommunicable diseases are rarely included in such materials.

“I don’t really look at research papers,” she said. “My own climate risk assessments, aside from following this framework, are largely based on my lived experience in this community.”

Gus Rick

Achieving a 17% carbon intensity cut by 2030 will be challenging given rising power demand, industrial growth and economic uncertainty. 

By Lin Zi, March 12, 2026

China plans to cut its carbon emissions per unit of GDP 17% by 2030, according to its draft five-year economic plan.

The target, down slightly from the 18% of the previous plan, offers insight into the policy trade-offs behind China’s development strategy. It also highlights potential focus areas for the country’s energy transition over the next five years.

The 15th Five Year Plan, for 2026-2030, did not set a cap on total carbon emissions, sparking discussion among observers. They note that China’s emissions trajectory will depend on the balance between economic growth and carbon-intensity reductions.

Meanwhile, rising electricity demand, shifts in industrial structure and the energy-consumption changes driven by electric vehicles may become key variables shaping China’s decarbonisation process.

How difficult will the new target be to achieve?

Among the agenda items at this year’s Two Sessions, which took place in Beijing 4-12 March, the climate content in the draft five-year plan attracted particular attention.

The plan’s new 17% carbon-intensity target will not be easy to achieve judging from recent performance. The last five-year plan, China’s 14th, had set two major goals to drive green and low-carbon development: reducing energy intensity (energy consumption per unit of GDP) by 13.5% and carbon intensity by 18%.

Neither target was fully achieved according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics. Energy intensity declined by 12.2%, while carbon intensity fell by 13%, a Dialogue Earth review of annual statistics reports found.

Recently however, the official methodology for measuring carbon intensity has quietly changed. As such, the new five-year plan states that carbon intensity has fallen by 17.7%.

The data previously released by the bureau had included only emissions related to energy combustion, explains Teng Fei, deputy director of the Institute of Energy, Environment and Economy at Tsinghua University. In the latest statistics reports released in February, emissions from industrial processes have become part of the equation too.

Although the 17% target for the 15th Five Year Plan period appears similar to the previous 18% target, it may in fact be more difficult to achieve, Teng believes, because the drivers behind carbon-intensity reductions could change.

Key uncertainties include GDP growth, the real-estate market and electricity demand. In the later years of the 14th Five Year Plan period, a sharp decline in real-estate investment reduced demand for steel and cement, lowering carbon intensity. It remains uncertain if in the coming five years China’s property market will recover or continue to decline.

It will be difficult to reduce energy intensity if future economic growth mainly comes from heavy industry or other energy-intensive sectors driven by central government investment, such as data centres, says Zhang Shuwei, chief economist at the Draworld Environment Research Center in Beijing. In that case, carbon-intensity cuts would rely more on the “dilution effect” of economic growth than falls in fossil-fuel use.

Why isn’t there a total emissions cap?

In 2024, China announced that from 2026 it would shift away from controlling energy consumption and towards controlling carbon emissions. This year’s Two Sessions confirmed that China will implement a “dual-control system” for both total emissions and emissions intensity.

However, the targets associated with the 15th Five Year Plan currently include only the carbon-intensity reduction goal, with no cap put on total carbon emissions.

A major reason for this is the significant uncertainty surrounding the economies of both China and the world, says Teng.

In theory, changes in total carbon emissions depend on economic growth and the rate of carbon-intensity decline. If China’s GDP grows by about 5% annually while carbon intensity falls by 17% over the next five years, total emissions could still increase slightly by 2030, says Teng, although the growth rate would slow significantly and gradually enter a plateau.

However, the two figures cannot simply be multiplied to estimate emissions changes. GDP growth of around 5% is often considered the upper-bound expectation, while a 17% carbon-intensity fall is more like the minimum requirement for emissions reductions – the actual decline could be larger.

Teng notes that even a one-percentage-point difference in GDP growth could lead to a roughly 5% difference in total economic output over five years, corresponding to 600-700 million tonnes of carbon emissions. Under such uncertainty, setting a strict cap on total emissions becomes difficult.

By comparison, many developed economies typically grow at 2-3% annually, with less economic volatility, making it easier to establish clear caps on total emissions.

Yang Muyi, senior Asia energy analyst at Ember, a UK-based climate think-tank, believes that given the current domestic economic pressures and tightening geopolitical tensions globally, it is already notable that China has not changed course and continues to pursue a green and low-carbon development pathway.

Controlling power demand: an overlooked lever

Many experts believe that rapid growth in electricity demand will be a critical challenge to China meeting its energy targets.

Since 2020, power consumption has grown faster than GDP for five consecutive years, and the trend is continuing. In 2025, it surpassed 10 trillion kilowatt-hours for the first time, reaching more than double the consumption of the United States.

Teng Fei says that in 2021-2025, more than 10% of newly added electricity demand came from unanticipated sources such as artificial intelligence, data centres and the ‘new three’, meaning solar cell, lithium battery and EV manufacturing.

“If this portion continues to grow during the 15th Five Year Plan period, achieving the 17% target will be quite difficult.”

If electricity consumption and generation were in balance, a 5% growth in demand would mean an additional 500-600 billion kWh of consumption each year, says Teng. China currently adds less than 400 billion kWh of renewable capacity annually.

“What happens to the remaining 200 billion kWh gap?” Teng asks. “If extreme climate events occur – for example droughts that reduce hydropower output – the gap becomes even larger.”

In practice, peak load is growing even faster than total electricity consumption, Teng explains. The fundamental solution, he argues, is to limit demand growth to below 4% per year, or roughly under 400 billion kWh, which newly added renewable generation could largely offset.

“This means we need to both expand renewable capacity and control the rapid growth of electricity demand,” Teng says. “At present, people focus much more on the former, while discussions about controlling demand are relatively rare. As a result, attention is often directed only at coal power. But the increase in coal power is a result, not the cause.”

Zhang Shuwei shares this view. He notes that if wind and solar capacity continue to expand by about 200 gigawatts per year, while electricity demand grows at below 5%, non-fossil electricity could gradually shrink the share of coal power until it accounts for 50% of generation by 2030. Its share is currently 38%, as stated by Jiemian News.

With China’s population beginning to decline, rapid power growth often accompanies expanding industrial investment and energy-intensive sectors, explains Zhang. Slower growth, by contrast, may signal a shift toward less power-hungry services and consumer sectors.

“In China’s current situation, that could actually indicate a healthier economic structure and stronger long-term sustainability,” he says.

When will China reach peak emissions?

Ahead of the Two Sessions, new policy signals had emerged regarding the timeline for China’s carbon-emissions peak.

Coal and oil consumption are expected to peak in the next five years, according to information disclosed by Qiushi, a Party-affiliated website.

By 2030, the share of fossil fuels in total energy consumption is projected to fall to below 75%. Coal consumption is expected to peak in around 2027 and then enter a plateau phase. Coal demand from the power and chemical industries is likely to continue rising, while demand from steel, building materials and some household uses may gradually decline, suggests Qiushi.

“This means that coal-fired power – the largest coal-consuming sector – will most likely peak around 2027 as well,” Yang Muyi says.

The trajectory of oil consumption is somewhat different. Demand for fuel-type refined oil, mainly used in transportation, has essentially already peaked. However, petrochemical demand for oil as an industrial feedstock is still expected to grow moderately. Overall, China’s total oil consumption is projected to peak around 2026, added Qiushi.

In Yang’s view, China’s emissions-reduction efforts are entering “deep water.” If the coal-power sector fails to peak on schedule, other industries would have to reduce coal use even earlier, particularly industrial sectors where emissions reductions are more difficult.

Close to half of the power generated in China is used in manufacturing. If the emissions from that power are attributed to manufacturing, then the sector accounts for about 60% of China’s emissions.

Industrial transformation and EVs are key

As energy consumption gradually reaches its peak, transforming industry is widely regarded as the key to achieving deeper emissions reductions.

“The growth of the ‘new three’ sectors is rapid, but their scale remains limited,” Yang says. “The foundation of the Chinese economy is still its massive industrial system. This also means that industrial carbon reduction is particularly important,” he adds.

He believes China is already ahead of many countries on industrial transformation. While many nations are still discussing how to expand wind and solar energy at scale, China began building a more systematic new energy system two years ago.

So the focus of the transition is increasingly extending to the industrial system itself. Policy tools such as “zero-carbon [industrial] parks” and the national carbon market aim to gradually reshape an industrial production system designed around fossil fuels.

Yang believes that once the “foundation” of the industrial economy changes, the strategic position of fossil fuels will naturally weaken.

Meanwhile, the rapid growth of electric vehicles (EVs) is already transforming China’s energy landscape.

The country has ranked first in the world in EV production and sales for 11 consecutive years. In 2025, both production and sales exceeded 16 million vehicles, and EVs accounted for over 50% of new car sales for the first time.

“The most surprising aspect of the 14th Five Year Plan period was how quickly electric vehicles developed – almost beyond everyone’s expectations,” Teng Fei says. “One direct result is that after oil consumption peaks, it could decline more rapidly during the 15th Five Year Plan period.”

“Human society has never seen a major country go through large-scale EV adoption before,” Teng says. “Some forecasts suggest the share could reach 60%, 70%, or even higher, but the exact level remains uncertain.”

The International Energy Agency, in its Global EV Outlook 2025, predicts that EVs could account for around 80% of new car sales in China by 2030.

If this trend continues, changes in China’s transportation energy structure could become a major force pushing oil demand to peak earlier than expected.