Energy Bureau: China's total installed capacity of wind power doubled for five consecutive years

According to the National Energy Administration, in the first quarter of this year, China’s wind power generation reached 18.8 billion kWh, an increase of 60.4%, which was 30 to 50 percentage points higher than the growth rate of thermal power, hydropower, and nuclear power during the same period.

Shi Lishan, director of the New Energy Division of the National Energy Administration, said that the increase in wind power output in the first quarter is a concentrated expression of the rapid development of wind power in China in recent years. He introduced that since 2005, China's total installed capacity of wind power has doubled in five consecutive years. As of the end of 2010, China's new wind power capacity was 16 million kilowatts, and its cumulative installed capacity reached 41.827 million kilowatts, ranking first in the world, of which 31 million kilowatts were installed to generate electricity.

At present, Gansu Jiuquan, Mengdong, Mengxi, Northeast China, Hebei, Xinjiang, Jiangsu, Shandong and other multi-million-kilowatt wind power bases are advancing in an orderly manner. Mengxi and Gansu Jiuquan wind power bases have installed more than 5 million kilowatts each, Hebei and Jilin. It has installed more than 2.5 million kilowatts in various regions. During the Shanghai World Expo, the Shanghai Donghai Bridge's 100,000 kilowatt offshore wind farm was connected to the grid to become the world’s first offshore wind farm except Europe. Subsequently, a total of 1 million kilowatts of offshore wind power concession projects were also launched in Jiangsu. In 2010, wind power generation reached 45 billion kWh, an increase of 63% over the previous year.

The rapid development of wind power is inextricably linked with the country’s policy support. During the “Eleventh Five-Year Plan” period, China has successively introduced a series of supporting policies and implementation rules such as the “Renewable Energy Law” and “Notice on Requirements for Wind Power Construction Management” and “Long-Term Development Plan for Renewable Energy” and so on. It provided legal protection and policy support for the long-term development of wind power, and clearly put forward the development strategy of equipment first and marketization. Up till now, wind power companies have enjoyed a series of preferential policies such as “three exemptions and three half of income tax” and 50% value-added tax (“VAT”). In addition to the benchmark price that the country has introduced, some provinces have also introduced wind power subsidies. The wind power on-grid prices in Shandong and Guangdong are higher than the national benchmark price.

The rapid development of wind power has benefited from the "equipment first" strategy. According to statistics, among the wind power installations installed in China in 2004, imported equipment accounted for 90%. In 2010, 90% of wind power equipment installed in China was installed in China. With the development of the domestic wind power market, more than 10 manufacturers of wind power equipment have achieved large-scale production. Seven manufacturing companies including Huarui and Goldwind have ranked among the top 15 wind power equipment manufacturers in 2010, of which Sinovel has taken the lead. The second in the world. After years of technological accumulation and capital investment, the domestic production level of wind power equipment has been continuously improved, and technological difficulties such as megawatt-class wind turbines and offshore wind turbines have been successively overcome. Tao Gang, vice president of Huarui Wind Power Technology Co., Ltd., said: “There is currently no wind power equipment component and it cannot be produced by Chinese companies.”

The localization of wind power equipment has led to a rapid increase in domestic wind power technology and operation quality. At present, domestic wind turbines generally adopt the mainstream technology of the world today, and the world's leading 3MW turbines and offshore wind power projects have settled in China. The unit kilowatt price has dropped from about 7,000 yuan in the early period of the “Eleventh Five-Year Plan” period to less than 4,000 yuan, a drop of 40%.

The rapid development of wind power has benefited from the market-oriented operation mode. Before 2005, domestic wind power was dominated by the power sector, there was no market competition, and electricity prices were high and development was slow. In recent years, the country has organized a total of five concession project tenders, through a concession tender for a total of 49 wind farm projects, with a total installed capacity of 8.8 million kilowatts. The market-oriented operation mechanism of wind power not only attracted a large amount of capital into the field of fan manufacturing, but also enabled wind turbine manufacturers to achieve full competition in technology, quality and cost control, and to promote the rapid improvement of domestic wind power technology and management level. In 2009, the National Development and Reform Commission promulgated the four-level benchmark price for wind power sub-regionally based on resource status, which allows investors to further improve the accuracy of economic feasibility assessment of wind farm construction projects.