China will ban the construction of new coal-based chemical facilities and coal-fired power plants until 2018 and continue to shed overcapacity in coal mining and oil refining. As part of China's 2016-2020 energy plan, expected to be officially unveiled soon, the new measures will cap total national energy consumption at 5 billion tonnes of standard coal equivalent by 2020, and put a ceiling on coal consumption at 4.1 billion tonnes, Xinhua reported. Coal equivalent measures the energy given off by different fuels in a standardised way regardless of type, such as coal, oil or natural gas.
The ban on projects will cut coal's share of the overall mix to 58 percent from 64 percent currently, and help achieve the government's target to phase out 500 million tonnes of coal production by 2020.
"The government's control over coal and refineries with severe over-capacity will be tougher. The extent of new plant approvals in 2019-20 will depend on the results of the capacity elimination," said an unnamed official involved in the planning cited by Xinhua.
Energy consumption in the world's second-largest economy rose at a record low rate of 1.5 percent in 2015, while coal consumption declined by 1.5 percent.
China's oil refineries are operating at a utilization rate 15 percent lower than the global average, and only new refineries that replace eliminated capacity will be approved, the official said.
