RENEWABLES

The Chinese government has said that it is promoting the increased use of wind power, and that it expects to have an installed capacity of at least 1000 MWe by the year 2000. The country is also building up its own wind turbine production capacity.

There are already 10 million family-sized wind turbines in operation, the China State Power Corporation (CSPC) claims. These have an aggregate generating capacity of 20 MWe. The county has the capacity to produce 30 000 wind turbines each year. The government policy is to develop wind power in regions remote from provincial grid systems.

In addition, There are 15 large wind farms operating in China. These have a combined capacity of over 30 MWe. The total national wind resource is estimated by the CSPC to be approximately 253 000 MWe.