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Green hydrogen is a clean secondary energy with great development potential and is regarded as an important option to achieve the goal of carbon neutrality. In recent years, China's green hydrogen industry has begun to develop under the guidance of national policies but is mainly faced with problems such as immature technology and high cost. Based on the actual development of China's green hydrogen industry, a system dynamics (SD) model considering the supply and demand of green hydrogen and the whole industry chain was established to predict the development of China's green hydrogen industry from 2021 to 2035. Furthermore, multi-scenario policy simulations were carried out on three typical policies: the vigorous promotion of technology research and development, lowprice hydrogen production and nearby consumption, and the promotion of green hydrogen substitution. The study found that: 1 China's green hydrogen industry would continue to rise steadily and accelerate after 2030. Under the baseline scenario, China' s green hydrogen production and the unit cost of green hydrogen would reach 15.81 million tons and be reduced to 20.98 yuan/kg, respectively, and the proportion of green hydrogen in the total hydrogen demand would increase to 29.7%. 2 The policy of vigorously promoting technology research and development could effectively promote the increase of green hydrogen production and the reduction of unit green hydrogen cost. Under the maximum policy intensity scenario, the green hydrogen production and unit green hydrogen cost in 2035 would be 24.843 million tons and 12.9 yuan/kg, respectively. And the effect of promoting the progress of hydrogen storage and transportation technology would be more remarkable. 3 The policy of low-price hydrogen production and nearby consumption could greatly reduce the unit cost of green hydrogen, thus promoting a significant increase in green hydrogen production. Under the maximum policy intensity scenario, the green hydrogen production and unit green hydrogen cost in 2035 would be 24.967 million tons and 15.62 yuan/kg, respectively. However, blindly reducing the cost of green hydrogen in the early stages of development without considering demand would lead to overcapacity and sharp price fluctuations. 4 The policy of promoting green hydrogen substitution could effectively stimulate green hydrogen consumption on the demand side, increase the proportion of green hydrogen in total hydrogen demand, and then stimulate investment to expand green hydrogen installed capacity and output. Under the maximum policy intensity scenario, the proportion of green hydrogen consumption in the total hydrogen demand would increase to 48.7%, and the green hydrogen production and unit green hydrogen cost in 2035 would be 25.865 million tons and 20.65 yuan/kg, respectively. Finally, based on the above research results, some policy suggestions are put forward to promote the development of China's green hydrogen industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the pillar role of renewable energy in the low-carbon energy transition and the balancing role of energy storage, many supporting policies have been promulgated worldwide to promote their development. To achieve the ambitious goal of no less than 1200 GW of wind and solar by 2030, China has also introduced policies to encourage the deployment of energy storage for the grid integration of renewable energy. The national policy is conducive to enhancing system flexibility for renewable integration, but it will also add the costs of renewable energy, especially when counting the regional differences. This paper adopts an improved levelized cost of electricity model to examine the total costs of renewable power co-deployed with energy storage in different provinces of China. The results show that the nationally unified energy storage co-deployment requirement, namely, 15% capacity ratio of renewable installation and 4 h duration, will negatively affect the economics of renewable generation, leading to an average cost increase in 15% and 21% for wind and photovoltaic generation, respectively. The economics of co-deploying energy storage under current market mechanism is inferior, but it can be effectively improved when energy storage participates in ancillary services market. With the revenue of frequency regulation, the cost of renewable co-deployed with energy storage can be even less than that without co-deployment in most provinces, except for Hebei, Jiangxi, and Gansu. An independent market entity status is thus conducive to encourage the co-deployment. Our finding also implies for a province-specific energy storage co-deployment policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coal-fired power plays a critical role in China's compliance with the Paris Agreement. This research quantifies China's stranded coal assets under different coal capacity expansion scenarios with an integrated approach and high-precision coal-fired power database. From a top-down perspective, firstly, the pathway of China's coal-fired power capacity consistent with the global 2°C scenario is outlined and then those stranded coal-fired power plants are identified with a bottom-up perspective. Stranded value is estimated based upon a cash flow algorithm. Results show that if coal capacity stabilizes during 2020–2030, China will only incur a sizeable yet manageable stranded asset loss (USD 55 billion, 2020–2045). However, a continued increase of coal-fired capacity, of another 200∼400 GW, would significantly enlarge the loss by 2.7∼7.2 times. Further, once commissioned coal-fired power would form a resource lock-in effect. Thus, it will miss a short-term opportunity to develop new energy sources and induce a long-term need to invest in coal-fired power negative emission technology. Therefore, halting the construction of new coal-fired plants is a low-cost and no-regret option for China. Key policy insights Even with the largest coal-fired power capacity in the world, China still has the chance to decommission the coal-fired power units gradually at a relatively low cost. Continuing to build new coal-fired power units in China will increase the risk of stranded assets, especially for North China Grid and Northwest China Grid. Taking immediate action to stop building new coal-fired power units would be the low-cost and no-regret option for China. The local financial sector needs to work with the energy sector to gradually withdraw from the coal sector and support clean and renewable energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is currently in the process of the middle and late stage of industrialization, and energy-related CO2 emissions have reached 10 Gt. This paper models energy consumption and related CO2 emissions and analyzes the development trends of various driving factors of CO2 emissions, explicitly considering China's economic and social development goals in the medium- and long-term. Different scenarios for 2020–2060 are projected based on the Kaya identity. Energy consumption will peak at 6,200 Mtce in 2035 in the BAU scenario with the energy-related CO2 emissions peaking at 11.1 Gt in 2026–2027 advanced by the rising non-fossil energy share, while energy consumption and CO2 emissions in the accelerated transition scenario would be potentially reduced by 300 Mtce and 300–400 Mt respectively. In the BAU scenario, the net CO2 emissions will remain around 2,000 Mt in 2060, after removing 1,800 Mt by CCS/CCUS, indicating that China needs to enhance its post-2030 policy to deliver the carbon neutrality pledge. Steady energy efficiency improvement, radical industrial and energy restructuring are three key driving forces for carbon neutrality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]