An energy revolution is underway in China’s major coal-rich province of Shanxi as the authorities aim to power the economy with more clean energy.

 

Wang Qirui, the director of the Shanxi Energy Bureau, says that the administration has been reforming the energy production in the province by drastically reducing coal production and by promoting green energy.

 

By the end of 2019, the province will have shut down 18 coal mines with an exit capacity of 18.95 million tons of coal per year,” Wang says. “We will also reduce the production capacity of six other coal mines by 8.5 million tons per year making a total reduction of 27.45 million tons per year.”

He says that the province closed a total of 106 coal mines and withdrew 115.56 million tons of capacity in the first four years of the 13th Five-Year Plan. “In 2020, it is planned to withdraw more than 15 million tons of production capacity per year,” he says.

 

Wang adds that Shanxi has been focusing on renewable energy resources in recent years. “In the past five years, Shanxi’s wind power capacity has grown at an average annual rate of 35% and solar energy capacity has grown at an average annual rate of 230%,” he says. “They (solar and wind) have become the second and third largest power source in the province. By the end of September 2019, the capacity of renewable energy facilities in Shanxi Province reached 24.47 million kilowatts, of which 11.77 million kilowatts from wind and 10.01 million kilowatts from solar.”

 

WindMagics has also made significant contribution to the ongoing transformation by completing the installation of 50 wind turbines at the 100MW wind farm at Kelan County in the northwest of Shanxi Province.