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This graph puts things in perspective https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Electricity_generation_in_China_by_source.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Elect

• matthewdgreen 3y ago
  An alternative (and hopefully pessimistic) take: China sees itself being in conflict with most of the world’s major military powers in the next decade, and is girding itself to eliminate reliance on its long oil supply chain. If you’re a pessimistic sort, you’d also note that many of the US’s Asian allies have a similarly long/disruptable oil supply chain, which will make their economies extremely vulnerable to disruption (as an example, notice how much damage a single Iranian-supplied militia has been able to do to middle eastern shipping.) Eliminating fossil fuel dependence isn’t just good for the environment. It might be a matter of national survival.
  • maxglute 3y ago
    It's obviously incentivized by energy security. But PRC has also stopped funding/constructing new coal plants abroad. So their incentive to limit new emissions is at least genuine. They could have pocketed 100s of billions in BRI coal plant projects. Like US did massive shale/LNG build out for energy security, except they ended up being the largest producer/exporter of both.