Spatial planning for China's renewable energy expansion toward 2030

China is rapidly advancing renewable energy deployment to decarbonize the power system and meet its climate targets. We develop a power-system model that co-optimizes capacity expansion and operation for China at hourly resolution over a full year, with 0.1° x 0.1° grid-cell siting for wind and solar deployment. Applying the model to the 15th Five-Year Plan period, we find that China could reach 766 GW of wind power and 1880 GW of solar power by 2030 in the base case, generating 4.9 PWh per year. The pathway requires detailed spatial planning, including additional inter-provincial ultra-high-voltage transmission and energy storage to integrate renewable generation.

Applied Energy 398, 126413