From BBC News:
China has overtaken Japan as the world’s second-largest electricity consumer and could take the top slot from the US, an energy think tank says.
The Paris-based International Energy Agency says that the demand for Chinese goods in the West is creating ever greater power needs in China.
China must face up to the implications of this growth and try to tackle both pollution and waste, the IEA says. [Full Text]
See also IEA’s press release on the new report “China’s Power Sector Reforms: Where to Next?”
See Shao Bingren’s remarks to a group of utility executives in Barcelona:
Toward the end of his speech, he quietly delivered one statistic that clearly outlined the dimensions of China’s ambitions in power. China intends to add 500 gigawatts of electric generating capacity in the next 15 years, he said. That is the equivalent of more than half of the total installed capacity of 968.6 gigawatts in the United States today. If China comes anywhere near achieving that goal, it will create enormous business opportunities for many years to come.
