The Ember energy think tank reports the numbers for China’s green energy exports this spring and they are mind-blowing.
The Hormuz energy crisis is having predictable effects. In March, China exported 68 gigawatts of solar panels, twice what it did in February and an all-time high. By a lot. That’s one month of exports, and it equals all the solar panel capacity ever installed in Spain — which is no slouch when it comes to solar energy.
Of that, 10 gigawatts went to Africa and 39 GW to Asia, which is, again, a record in both instances. Percentage-wise, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia and Malaysia saw some of the biggest increases in PV imports from China in March compared to April; in Nigeria it was an astonishing 519%. In absolute numbers, India led with 6.6 gigawatts of PV brought in from China.
In all, 50 countries saw an all-time record in the solar panel imports from China in March.
Since solar plus battery has increasingly proven an effective combination for providing 24-hour electricity, China’s exports of batteries also surged in March.
The energy crisis has been severe for many countries around the world. Kenya has been wracked by fuel price protests for the past week that on Monday left 4 dead and 30 injured, with hundreds arrested. Over the weekend public transport workers went on strike, leaving people stranded, but they have temporarily gone back to work.
There has also been unrest in Mozambique and the Comoros islands.
Although these disturbances focused on gasoline and diesel prices, natural gas prices are also high because of the Gulf crisis and in some countries restaurants have closed for lack of cooking fuel.
Solar panels plus electric vehicles can solve this problem, which isn’t going away, since the Gulf oil and gas region has been permanently destabilized by Netanyahu and Trump.
Inside China, solar installations have slowed from their earlier breakneck pace, as government subsidies are phased out and the government worries about the stability of the grid. Still, there was so much new solar in the pipeline that China’s solar capacity in Jan-April surged 26.6 percent year over year to reach 1.25 terawatts.
China Daily reports that even China’s Big Oil giants such as Sinopec are rapidly diversifying into hydrogen, solar and wind.
China Daily quotes Lin Boqiang, head of the China Institute for Studies in Energy Policy at Xiamen University, as saying, “The severe supply disruptions and soaring oil prices triggered by global crises are undeniably accelerating the pace of the global energy transition.”
Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Distinguished University Professor in the History Department at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page
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