In an opinion piece, John Kemp of Reuters notes that China’s coal production has slowed slightly after rapid growth in the last two years.

Data published by China’s National Bureau of Statistics show that China’s mines produced 1,858 million tonnes of coal in the first five months of 2024. This figure reflects a fall of 54 million tonnes (-3%) compared with a year earlier.

In the first five months of 2023 and 2022, coal production grew by 5% and 12% respectively. This massive expansion was a response to the need to guarantee energy security in the face of rapid growth in consumption accompanied by erratic hydro generation. The latter was caused by prolonged drought late in 2022 and throughout 2023. Significant decreases in hydro generation meant reliance on record amounts of thermal power generation, mostly fired by coal.

Following heavy spring rains in 2024, hydro generation has rebounded and China has been able to make full use of its newly-commissioned hydro dams on the Yangtze river system. Increases in solar and wind generation have also facilitated the slowdown in coal production – and thereby China’s gradual transition to renewable power generation.

The government’s long-term transition plan includes creating a new coal capacity reserve system of up to 300 million tonnes per year. Kemp explains that the capacity reserve is intended to respond to “extreme situations” including “severe fluctuations in the international energy market, adverse weather conditions, and dramatic changes in supply and demand stability”.

In summary, he says, the reserve could be used to “offset future droughts, heatwaves, extreme winter cold, gyrations in imported gas prices, or any embargo imposed by the United States and its allies.”