Make electricity greener

With the smooth completion of 502 system commissioning, on December 30, 2020, Qingyu DC Project withstood the operation assessment of full voltage, full current and overload, and officially entered the full voltage operation state of ±800 kV, which is also a major innovation in the development and application of UHV transmission technology in China and the promotion of large-scale development and utilization of new energy. On the one hand, Qinghai is rich in energy resources, and on the other hand, Henan has a huge demand for energy, so the Qingyu DC project has built a bridge for Qinghai energy delivery.

Build delivery channels to allow more areas to use Qinghai "green electricity"

Qinghai Province is rich in clean energy resources, with 100,000 square kilometers of desertification land that can be used for photovoltaic power generation and wind farm construction, and more than 3 billion kilowatts of solar energy and 75 million kilowatts of wind energy that can be developed. From May 9 to August 16, 2020, the State Grid Qinghai Power Company used all clean energy for power supply in Sanjiangyuan for 100 consecutive days, promoting the on-site consumption of clean energy by 500 million KWH, reducing coal consumption by 61,000 tons and carbon dioxide emissions by 166,000 tons.

Qinghai - Henan ±800 kV UHV DC project is the first UHV transmission channel built by the State Grid Corporation to support the large-scale development of new energy in Qinghai, and it is also the first power transmission channel built for clean energy transmission in the world. The project starts in Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Qinghai Province and ends in Zhumadian city of Henan province, passing through Qinghai, Gansu, Shaanxi and Henan provinces, with a total length of 1,563 kilometers.

Li Qingjun, deputy director of the construction department of the State Grid Qinghai Power Company, said that as of December 31, 2020, the Qingyu DC project had delivered 3.41 billion KWH of "green electricity" to Henan, equivalent to reducing raw coal consumption by 1.54 million tons and reducing carbon dioxide by 2.53 million tons. This energy artery not only allows Henan to use Qinghai's clean energy, but also radiates Hubei, Hunan and Jiangxi provinces. From July to August 2020, Hubei and Jiangxi purchased 76 million KWH of electricity through the Qingyu DC Project.

The scale of development and utilization of renewable energy across the country has expanded rapidly

Green energy development plays an important role in reducing carbon emission intensity. According to the white paper "China's Energy Development in the New Era" released by The State Council Information Office in December 2020, "carbon intensity in 2019 was reduced by 48.1 percent from the 2005 level, exceeding the 2020 carbon intensity reduction target of 40-45 percent from the 2005 level, and reversing the situation of rapid growth of carbon dioxide emissions."

China is speeding up the construction of a clean, low-carbon, safe and efficient energy system, and the scale of development and utilization of renewable energy across the country has expanded rapidly. By the end of August 2020, the cumulative installed capacity of hydropower, wind power and photovoltaic power generation had reached 360 million kilowatts, 220 million kilowatts and 220 million kilowatts respectively, ranking first in the world. By the end of 2019, China's installed nuclear power capacity under construction was 65.93 million kilowatts, ranking second in the world.

At the same time, China's energy consumption structure to clean and low-carbon transformation accelerated. According to preliminary calculations, coal consumption accounted for 57.7% of total energy consumption in 2019, 10.8 percentage points lower than in 2012; Clean energy consumption, including natural gas, hydropower, nuclear power and wind power, accounted for 23.4 percent of total energy consumption, an increase of 8.9 percentage points over 2012. Non-fossil energy accounted for 15.3% of total energy consumption, an increase of 5.6 percentage points over 2012, and the target of reaching around 15% of non-fossil energy consumption by 2020 has been achieved ahead of schedule.

It is worth mentioning that China's energy science and technology level has been rapidly improved, the establishment of a complete hydropower, nuclear power, wind power, solar power and other clean energy equipment manufacturing industry chain, successfully developed and manufactured the world's largest single capacity of 1 million kilowatts hydropower units. In July 2020, the first 10 MW offshore wind turbine independently developed in China was successfully connected to the grid in Fuqing City, Fujian Province. The current single capacity of Asia's largest, the world's second offshore wind turbine, the hub center height of about 115 meters from the sea level, wind turbine sweep area equivalent to 3.7 standard football fields - according to reports, in the annual average wind speed of 10 meters/second, a single unit annually delivered clean energy can meet the electricity needs of 20,000 families of three. Cut coal consumption by 12,800 tons and carbon dioxide emissions by 33,500 tons.

In addition, China's renewable energy power utilization rate has increased significantly, and in 2019, the national average wind power utilization rate reached 96%, the photovoltaic power generation utilization rate reached 98%, and the water energy utilization rate in the main river basin reached 96%.

We will build a unified, open, competitive and orderly energy market system

"Renewable energy has become a major lever in the fight against climate change. In order to achieve the goal of peaking carbon emissions and carbon neutrality, renewable energy will become the majority of China's energy growth in the future." National Development and Reform Commission Energy Research Institute renewable energy development center deputy director Tao Ye believes.

The development and utilization of non-fossil energy is the main way to promote the green and low-carbon energy transformation. China gives priority to non-fossil energy in energy development, and vigorously promotes low-carbon energy to replace high-carbon energy and renewable energy to replace fossil energy.

At the "Belt and Road" clean Energy Development Forum held in 2020, Lu Qiang, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, automatic control and power system expert, said: "On the one hand, we need to strengthen independent innovation, reduce the cost of clean energy production, accelerate the transformation of clean energy technology by guiding scientific research and development and innovation experiments, and stimulate the vitality of the technology market; On the other hand, it is necessary to establish and improve the market-based trading mechanism for clean energy, and actively promote the construction of the spot market for electricity. At the same time, we should build a platform for sharing clean energy, expand the scale of market transactions, and maximize the utilization of clean energy."

According to the white paper, to promote clean energy carbon reduction, we also need to build a unified, open and orderly competitive energy market system. We will build trading platforms for coal, electricity, oil and natural gas in accordance with the characteristics of different energy varieties to promote interaction between supply and demand.