Supply, Demand, and Consequences

Photo: Epa/Eyepress/Landov

At The End Of The1990s, China seemed to be successfully limiting demands made on its electricity sector. Power consumption was increasing at a slower rate than the economy as a whole, the ratio of industrial production to energy consumed was improving, and the levels of some of the most worrisome pollutants were dropping. China even appeared to be doing better than expected at limiting greenhouse-gas emissions. Since then, however, the situation has deteriorated drastically.

Electricity Demand. Chinese economic planners said they thought demand would increase by about 5 percent last year, but in fact it grew nearly 15 percent. At the end of this year, total demand is expected to be about 420 gigawatts, nearly 20 percent higher than two years before.

Photo: Hai Ying/Epa/Landov

Coal Is Still King. Although China has sharply expanded its hydroelectric capacity, notably by starting to bring the Three Gorges Dam on the upper Chang (Yangtze) River into operation, about three-quarters of the capacity being added consists of coal-fired thermal plants. New investment is expected to add 2.3 to 2.5 billion tons of coal annually to the country's supply by 2010 [photo above].

Pollution Worse ThanEver. With an annual death toll associated with air pollution of roughly 1 million, China was trying hard in the mid- and late 1990s to reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide and fine particulates. It had some success. SO₂ emissions stayed below 20 million tons from 1998 until last year, when they hit 21.6 million tons.

Regional Impact. The ill effects from sharply rising coal combustion are not just local. Acid rain originating from Chinese SO₂ emissions has become a major concern in neighboring Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea.

Global Dimensions. Droughts in northwest China [photo right] and in India have been blamed on a gigantic brown cloud, laced with soot and other pollutants, that blankets much of Asia from India to China and down to the South Pacific islands during the winter. As more emissions make that cloud ever bigger, greenhouse gases also grow, threatening the climate everywhere.