- Wasted energy is rising: Grid bottlenecks and electricity-market arrangements that limit system flexibility have pushed solar curtailment rates — wind and solar output that could have been generated but was instead reduced or withheld — to between 10% and 17% in northwestern resource-rich provinces like Qinghai, Xinjiang, and Gansu. Wind curtailment across northern and northwestern corridors ranges between 4% and 9%.
- Grid infrastructure is lagging and heavily reliant on coal: to transmit megabases’ wind and solar requires 27 ultra-high voltage direct current (UHVDC) lines, yet the 15th Five-Year Plan aims to add only ten. Across China’s UHVDC network, wind and solar power represent only around one-fifth of transmitted electricity, while coal accounts for 42%. And planned transmission remains coal-linked, with eleven prospective lines dedicated to wind and solar megabases paired with 129 GW of wind and solar and 40 GW of coal power.
To bypass rising curtailment, China’s megabases are pivoting to a strategy that pairs long-distance exports with local industrial demand, through energy storage, green-power direct connections, industrial parks, and green hydrogen.
China leads the global green hydrogen sector with over 10 GW of operating wind and solar capacity dedicated to hydrogen production — nearly eight times the operating capacity of the rest of the world combined.
Yet, GEM research finds that this localization strategy creates a dangerous loophole for “coal lock-in.” Industrial regulators increasingly encourage renewable integration to approve high-emissions heavy industry projects. However, the renewable components often represent a minute fraction of overall energy consumption.
For example, Baofeng Energy, the world’s largest coal-to-olefins producer, commissioned an olefins project in Inner Mongolia in 2025 that couples a 1,000 megawatt wind and solar project to produce green hydrogen. While this reduces coal consumption by 210,000 tonnes annually, it accounts for a mere 2.2% of the facility’s total annual coal intake, raising the risk that renewable integration becomes a small compliance cost while long-term coal use remains largely intact.
Aiqun Yu, Research Analyst & Senior East Asia Strategist at Global Energy Monitor, said, “The purpose of the megabases is clear, and that’s to accelerate nationwide decarbonization. But the new Five-Year Plan has so much more room for the country to continue its climate leadership. Ultimately, the success of China’s renewable energy megabases will not be measured by the gigawatts added, but by the volume of coal they actively displace.”
