Interpretation and reflection on my country's "Energy Production and Consumption Revolution Strategy (2016-2030)"

Among the energy problems faced by countries around the world, China's energy problem may be the most complex and the most thought-provoking. Energy is the foundation of development. Scientifically formulating my country's energy development strategy and making plans under the guidance of the strategy are of great significance to the sustainable development of the country's economy and society. my country's "Energy Production and Consumption Revolution Strategy (2016-2030)" (hereinafter referred to as the "Strategy") adopted by the National Energy Commission has made a comprehensive strategic deployment for my country's energy revolution in the next 15 years, which has important practical and long-term significance.

Energy development: entering a new stage of improving quality and efficiency

The Strategy points out that my country's energy development is entering a new stage of transformation from total expansion to quality and efficiency improvement. This is necessary for my country's supply-side structural reform and improving the quality of economic development, breaking through resource and environmental constraints, controlling air and water pollution, and promoting ecological civilization construction, actively responding to climate change and achieving long-term sustainable development, and increasing energy public services, benefiting all people, and accelerating national modernization.

The previously released "13th Five-Year Plan for Energy Development" proposed to implement dual control of total energy consumption and energy intensity, fundamentally reverse the extensive growth mode of energy consumption, and require that the proportion of coal consumption in primary energy should be reduced to below 58% by 2020, and the combined proportion of non-fossil energy and low-carbon energy such as natural gas should reach 25%. On this basis, the "Strategy" puts forward further energy revolution goals. In 2030, "the use of renewable energy, natural gas and nuclear energy will continue to grow, and the use of high-carbon fossil energy will be greatly reduced." Non-fossil energy accounts for about 20% of total energy consumption, and natural gas accounts for more than 15%, that is, the combined proportion of low-carbon energy reaches 35%, and the new energy demand is mainly met by clean and low-carbon energy; promote the clean and efficient use of fossil energy, and carbon dioxide emissions will reach a peak around 2030 and strive to reach the peak as early as possible; unit GDP energy consumption reaches the current world average level (in 2015, my country's unit GDP energy consumption was 1.5 times the world average); energy technology level ranks among the best in the world. Looking ahead to 2050, "total energy consumption will be basically stable, with non-fossil energy accounting for more than half", and a green, low-carbon, efficient and modern energy system will be built.

Energy consumption revolution: saving and high efficiency

The Strategy summarizes the energy consumption revolution as "creating a new situation of conservation and efficiency". It proposes: 1. Implement the "dual control" action of total energy consumption and intensity, take the dual control as a binding indicator, and promote the formation of a forced mechanism for economic transformation and upgrading. The Strategy proposes that "the total energy consumption will be controlled within 5 billion tons of standard coal" in 2020 and "within 6 billion tons of standard coal" in 2030. I think this goal is expected to be achieved better. It is necessary to focus on controlling the total coal consumption and the incremental oil consumption, and encourage the consumption of renewable energy; 2. Adjust the industrial structure and promote energy conservation and emission reduction. Promote the early peak of energy consumption in the industrial sector, and promote industrial green manufacturing and circular production. Implement strict energy efficiency and emission standards for high-energy-consuming industries such as steel and building materials, improve building energy-saving standards, curb unreasonable "large-scale demolition and construction", and build a green and low-carbon transportation system. Establish and improve the initial allocation system of pollution rights and carbon emission rights, and cultivate and develop a national carbon emission rights trading market; 3. Promote new urban and rural electrification and low-carbon urbanization, and replace coal and oil with electricity (with the optimization of the power supply structure, this will not be coal instead of oil). Eliminate direct burning of coal at the terminal of buildings, increase renewable electricity supply and heat (cooling). Improve the level of universal electricity service in rural areas, promote the electrification of agricultural production, implement photovoltaic (thermal) poverty alleviation projects, vigorously develop solar energy, geothermal energy, biomass energy, and agricultural and forestry solid waste resource utilization, and make rural areas a "fertile ground" for the development of new energy. Through information technology, comprehensively improve the level of intelligent and efficient terminal energy consumption; 4. Vigorously advocate a reasonable energy lifestyle and consumption model, encourage reasonable living housing and small-displacement, new energy citizen cars with policies, and guide the public to participate in the supervision of all aspects of energy consumption in an orderly manner.

A revolution in energy production: clean and low-carbon

The Strategy summarizes the energy supply revolution as "building a new clean and low-carbon system". First, based on the actual situation, we will optimize the stock and promote the clean, efficient and centralized development of coal. We will replace civilian scattered coal with a variety of high-quality energy sources and promote coal-to-gas and coal-to-electricity projects. We will build efficient and ultra-low emission coal-fired power units to achieve the level of pollutant emissions from coal-fired power plants to gas-fired power plants and prevent new overcapacity in coal-fired power. We will promote the internalization of the external environmental costs of fossil energy and reasonably determine the level of coal taxes and fees. Second, we will mainly rely on clean new energy to achieve incremental energy demand and usher in a new era of low-carbon energy supply. We will promote the high-proportion development of renewable energy, increase the grid connection rate of hydropower, wind power and solar power, and reduce the cost of power generation. We will develop various forms of biomass energy, geothermal energy and ocean energy according to local conditions. We will adopt the latest safety standards, develop nuclear power safely and efficiently, and strengthen the coordinated and supporting development of the entire nuclear power industry chain. We will actively promote the doubling of natural gas (including unconventional natural gas) and strive to triple the natural gas supply capacity by 2030 compared with 2015. We will promote distributed natural gas and distributed renewable energy to become important energy utilization methods. Third, comprehensively build an "Internet +" smart energy network to promote the deep integration of energy and modern information technology. Strengthen the intelligent construction of the power system. The centralized smart grid and distributed energy network interact with each other, build distributed energy storage equipment based on the user side, rely on new energy, energy storage, flexible network and microgrid technologies, realize the efficient and flexible access and production and consumption integration of distributed energy, and build an energy Internet with coordinated development, integrated complementarity of "source-grid-load-storage-use".

Energy technology revolution: strategic guarantee for energy transformation

The energy technology revolution is the support for the revolution in energy production and consumption, and is also a strategic guarantee for seizing the commanding heights of scientific and technological development and ensuring the long-term security of my country's energy. At present, global energy technology innovation has entered a highly active period, which has strongly promoted the transformation of the world's energy to green, low-carbon and efficient. my country's energy must vigorously promote technological innovation, industrial innovation and business model innovation, transform technological advantages into economic advantages, cultivate new growth points for the upgrading of energy technology and related industries, and seize the initiative in this international competition for energy transformation. What my country needs to pay special attention to are: high-efficiency energy-saving technology; clean energy development and utilization technology; smart energy technology, including the deep integration of the Internet and distributed energy technology, smart grid technology and energy storage technology (including physical energy storage and chemical energy storage); strengthen basic research on energy science and technology, vigorously carry out cutting-edge innovative research, especially cross-disciplinary innovation and disruptive technological innovation with materials science, information technology, etc.; strengthen and deepen international exchanges and cooperation in energy science and technology and management, and promote new substantive breakthroughs in my country's energy system revolution.

In order to implement various strategic goals and tasks, the "Strategy" proposed more than a dozen major strategic actions, including the "National Energy Conservation Action" and the "Rural New Energy Action". These actions embody the main strategic ideas and make the implementation of the "Strategy" operational.