No new wind farm projects for areas with much wind power wasting

New wind farm projects will not approved the following year in places where more than 20 percent of their wind electricity is abandoned, China’s energy regulator said on Wednesday.

Provinces and cities that aim to tap wind resources will increase electricity transfer through improving grid connectivity, the National Energy Administration (NEA) said.

To improve its energy mix and battle worsening air pollution, China has tilted increasingly toward clean energy including wind power, hydropower and nuclear power.

China’s newly installed wind power capacity jumped to a record high of 19.81 million kilowatts in 2014. Wind power generated 153.4 billion kilowatt hours of electricity last year, accounting for 2.78 percent of the country’s total generated electricity and making it the third-largest source of electricity after thermal power and hydropower.

However, wind electricity waste is a headache for China thanks to imbalanced distribution of wind resources and imperfect grid system.Wind-rich provinces are mainly in the less developed north and northwest regions where electricity supply exceeds demand.

An average of 8 percent of wind electricity was abandoned last year, down 4 percentage points from the previous year. Yet, the situation turned worse in the first three months of this year with 18.6 percent of wind power production going to waste, 6.6 percentage points higher year on year.

The NEA attributed the increased wasting during the period to better wind conditions and weak demand of electricity.