(TibetanReview.net, Apr19’22) – China has determined that the wind energy potential of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) is enough to power the UK, Germany and France combined, and plans to further develop the region to help meet its ambitious climate targets, reported the bloomberg.com Apr 18. However, translating the potential into production is seen as a big challenge.
Poor roads will make transporting equipment difficult, thin air might make turbines less efficient, and it will be costly to build power lines needed to distribute electricity to more populous areas, the report noted.
Nevertheless, the region has enough sites with strong, steady wind to install 600 gigawatts of turbines, with another 420 gigawatts possible in parts of the plateau in neighboring regions including Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan, Yunnan and Xinjiang, the report cited China’s National Climate Center as saying in a report last month.
And the National Energy Administration was stated to have followed up shortly after with a guidance to accelerate construction of clean energy bases in TAR.
TAR currently has only 4.8 gigawatts of total installed power capacity, the lowest in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), with just 30 megawatts of wind turbines, China Electricity Council data was stated to show.
The lofty numbers from TAR were stated to have added to a general feeling of optimism in the Chinese wind industry, which had managed to bring down prices to record-low levels even as costs had risen for everything from coal to natural gas to solar panels and even turbines abroad.
The report cited Qin Haiyan, chief secretary of the Chinese Wind Energy Association, as saying in a recent interview with China Times that the cost of electricity from wind turbines will be halved again in the next three to five years, and that the PRC’s wind resource potential “has no ceiling.”