Energy in China

Unlike coal, China has relatively small oil reserves. Messages from the government to reduce the use of oil stresses the fact that serious measures have to be found to avoid wasteful consumption. Currently oil accounts for 22.7% of national consumption, and is expected to have reached 130 million tons of imported crude oil in 2005. China has also plans for increasing their oil reserves. As part of the efforts to reduce wasteful oil consumption, a guideline catalogue for industrial sectors was issued in January this year. It encourages for example the production of low emission, economical cars and cars using renewable energy like electricity and liquid petroleum gas. Generators exploiting oil to produce energy were listed as 'eliminated'.

Gas currently accounts for 2.6 percent of China's national consumption. China has around 1.2 percent of the world's total reserve. In 2006, the government plans to move from government price control to market orientated pricing for natural gas. This is to encourage investment in exploration. In order to use gas to reduce heavy reliance on coal and oil, projects of pipelines linking gas deposits in the West and energy consuming Provinces in the East and South are necessary. Currently the West - East Gas Pipeline, which's construction started in July 2002, is aimed to transport gas to the eastern regions of Shanghai. In addition, in December 2005 plans for a second natural gas pipeline, this time to the Guangdong Province, have been revealed. However, the Government's new focus supported by a new law recently passed is to set policies and encourage renewable energy.

chinese translation | japanese translation | korean translation