China's power authorities will concentrate on energy conservation
and environmental protection as they continue with efforts to
restructure the country's power industry, officials announced
at a recent seminar.
The government
will continue to shut down small, wasteful and environmentally
disastrous thermal power plants while encouraging the development
of large thermal generators and hydropower in the 10th Five-Year
Plan period (2001-05), China Daily learned at the 2001 Sino-German
New Technology Workshop on Energy Efficiency and Renewable
Energy held recently in Beijing.
"To guarantee
sustainable development in the power sector, we should optimize
the country's energy structure over the next five to 10 years,
paying particular attention to energy conservation and environmental
protection," said Zhang Xiaolu, director of the Department
of Science and Technology and Environment Protection under
the State Power Corporation.
The corporation,
which generates the lion's share of power used across the
country, will continue to employ modern technology to generate
more power while reducing emissions, including sulphur dioxide
and suspended particles, Zhang said.
According to the
corporation's 2005 agenda issued at the seminar, China's total
installed power capacity will top 355 million kilowatts in
2005, and 450 million kilowatts in 2010. Last year installed
capacity was 314 million kilowatts.
"Our long-term
goal is to form a nationwide power supply network with the
Three Gorges Hydropower Plant at the core and also to have
an optimized energy distribution structure," Zhang said.
To date, China's
proven coal deposits stand at 1,000 billion tons and account
for 90 per cent of all known reserves of primary energy, including
coal, oil and natural gas, inside China.
This energy resource
composition indicates that China should focus on utilizing
thermal power, Zhang said.
(China Daily 03/19/2001)
|