China said it would stop coal power construction, but CoalSwarm activists have caught it restarting construction at many plants it said it would close. It’s a tsunami of coal plants according to EndCoal. We’re talking about new capacity of 259GW, equivalent to the entire US coal fleet or more than ten times the total Australian coal fleet (23GW).

China said it was done with these coal plants. Satellite imagery shows otherwise.

By Nathanael Johnson on Sep 25, 2018

Newly released satellite photos appear to show continuing construction of coal plants that China said it was cancelling last year, according to CoalSwarm.

In January 2017, China announced that it was canceling more than 100 coal plants across 13 provinces. At the time, a researcher familiar with Chinese politics said that regional officials might try to skirt the central government’s order.

The Huadian Plant was suspended in Jan 2017, but look at those cooling towers…. (Slide the centre line left and right).

Satellite imagery from Planet, February 2017 to March 2018, shows construction clearly ongoing at the plant.

Matt McGrath, BBC News

Building work has restarted at hundreds of Chinese coal-fired power stations, according to an analysis of satellite imagery.

The research, carried out by green campaigners CoalSwarm, suggests that 259 gigawatts of new capacity are under development in China. The authors say this is the same capacity to produce electricity as the entire US coal fleet. The study says government attempts to cancel many plants have failed. … there was a surge in new coal projects approved at provincial level in China between 2014 and 2016. This happened because of a decentralisation programme that shifted authority over coal plant construction approvals to local authorities. The report says that at present China has 993 gigawatts of coal power capacity, but the approved new plants would increase this by 25%.

The surge in new projects will exceed China’s current Five-year-plan coal cap of 1100 GW.

Apparently this will create more white-elephants. The genius of communist planning:

“Given that China’s coal fleet operates less than half the time, 259 GW additional coal power capacity is unneeded and represents US$210 billion in capital expenditures that could instead fund nearly 300 GW of solar PV or 175 GW of onshore wind power.”

— Endcoal

Who knows what the truth is? Coal prices are rising.

Coal is the only dying asset where people want more and are paying more

The Inconvenient Truth Of Rising Coal Prices

Tim Treadgold, Forbes

Coal prices are not supposed to be rising as governments tighten environmental controls, but that’s precisely what is happening at the premium end of the coal market where prices have soared.

Over the past six months, the price of top quality thermal coal exported from the Australian port of Newcastle has risen by 25% to $115 a ton, a move reflected in the share prices of Australian coal exporters, such as Whitehaven Coal, which is up 27% over the same time, and Stanmore Coal, which is up 16%.

h/t El Gordo, GWPF

REFERENCE

Australian coal fired capacity, Chapter 2. Australian Parliament. Specifically, the Australian Energy Council Submission 44. Table 1. Nov 2016 (minus Hazelwood).

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