As the Rest of the World Retreats, China Doubles its Wind Power Targets

 

[By Niu Yuhan]

China aims to add at least 120 GW of new wind power capacity annually during the upcoming 15th five-year-plan period from 2026 to 2030, including at least 15 GW of offshore wind, reported Xinhua. The 120 GW target is over twice the annual goal of 50 GW set in 2020.

It has also set its total installed wind power capacity goals at 1.3 TW by 2030 and at least 2 TW by 2035.

These targets were announced on 20 October at the 2025 China Wind Power event, where over 1,000 global wind companies jointly issued the “Beijing Declaration on Wind Energy 2.0” outlining China’s most ambitious wind power goals yet, Xinhua noted. 

“China’s wind industry has a strong foundation, vast market potential and rapid innovation,” giving it the “ability to promote sustained and stable growth of wind power”, Xinhua quoted Pan Huimin, deputy director of the National Energy Administration’s New Energy and Renewable Energy Department, as saying at the event.

She noted that the government plans to speed up renewable energy projects in desert regions, promote offshore wind power development, and expand “wind+” models, such as wind-plus-storage and wind-to-hydrogen, the outlet reported.

The earlier 50 GW annual goal was pledged in the first Beijing Declaration on Wind Energy, released in 2020 and signed by over 400 companies. That declaration had targeted 800 GW of total installed wind power capacity by 2030. Since it was signed, China’s progress has surpassed expectations: from 2020 to 2024, the average annual wind power added exceeded 60 GW, Xinhua noted.

In September, China updated its Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), pledging that by 2035, combined solar and wind capacity will reach around 3,600 GW – over six times the 2020 level. 

Analysts, however, see this goal as conservative given the pace of renewables expansion. The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) estimates China could realistically reach 4,500 GW of wind and solar capacity by 2035.

Li Sheng, president of the Hydropower and Water Resources Planning and Design Institute, told the 21st Century Business Herald that integrating such massive amounts of fluctuating power into the grid could require a new power system that coordinates power generation, grid, load and storage to ensure the electricity can be delivered and used.

Building this would involve promoting greater grid flexibility, speeding up development of renewable energy storage, as well as modernization of power systems, he noted.

Niu Yuhan is Dialogue Earth’s assistant editor and joined in 2022, based in London. She holds a BA in journalism from Shih Hsin University and a MA in international relations from King’s College London. She previously worked for The Paper and WWF-UK. Yuhan is interested in energy transition, deforestation and the impact of climate change on the global economy. 

This article appears courtesy of Dialogue Earth and may be found in its original form here.