China’s National Development and Reform Commission released its renewable energy development plan for the 2006 to 2010 period, which doubles the prior wind power generating capacity target for 2010. According to the plan, by 2010 China will have a total wind power generating capacity of 10,000MW. In the previously released renewable energy development plan for the 2006 to 2020 periods, the target for 2010 was set at just 5,000MW.
Shi Pengfei, Vice Director of the Chinese Wind Energy Association, stated that the new figure only includes wind farms that have been hooked up to power grids. He said he was also optimistic that China would be able to hit the new 2010 target.
Shi stated, "The government hopes that non hydropower renewable energy projects can contribute 40 million megawatt hours of electricity of the country’s total electricity generation in 2010. As biomass power capacity is growing relatively slowly, wind power will have to reach about 20,000MW in order to hit that target."
The new plan also states that, by 2010, China will have around 30 large wind farms built and five large wind power bases built. The nation will also begin preparations to build an extremely large wind power base with over 10,000MW of installed capacity in northwestern China’s Gansu Province, one in the northern Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and one offshore base near the eastern coastal province of Jiangsu and its neighboring municipality, Shanghai.
In addition, to ensure that the ambitious targets can be met, the NDRC also said it wants to see domestic wind turbine manufacturing capacity reach 5,000MW by 2010, and enough components for turbines to generate 8,000MW. Furthermore, the government is pushing the industry to be able to manufacture wind turbines with a capacity above 1.5MW, and will start to develop 3MW offshore wind turbines.
