For the first time on record, coal accounted for less than half of China’s electricity in the first six months of 2025 C.E. — a symbolic turning point for the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter. The milestone reflects years of rapid renewable expansion in a country that still burns more coal than the rest of the world combined.
At a glance
- Coal’s new share: Coal-fired plants supplied 49.7% of China’s electricity output from January through June 2025 C.E., according to China’s National Energy Administration — the first time that figure has fallen below 50%.
- Renewable electricity growth: Renewable sources supplied more than 40% of electricity in the same period, with wind and solar alone generating nearly a quarter of the total.
- Grid investment surge: Spending on grid infrastructure rose 14% in the first half of 2025 C.E. from a year earlier, while investment in energy storage climbed 74% as China works to absorb its growing clean power supply.
What the milestone means
The shift is not the result of coal declining in absolute terms. Output from thermal power plants actually increased in the first half of 2025 C.E. as electricity demand grew, driven in part by high-tech manufacturing, electric-vehicle charging, and data centers. Coal’s share fell because renewable sources expanded even faster.
That distinction matters. China is not yet burning less coal — it is simply generating so much more clean electricity that coal’s slice of the pie has shrunk below a historic threshold for the first time.
“This is a phased achievement resulting from the long-term replacement of fossil-fuel generation by non-fossil energy, marking a new breakthrough in China’s green and low-carbon energy transition,” said Xing Yiteng, deputy director-general of the National Energy Administration’s Department of Development and Planning, at a press briefing in 2025 C.E.
That framing — “phased achievement” — is precise. This is one step in a long transition, not an endpoint. Still, the symbolism carries weight. Any lasting shift away from coal in China carries implications well beyond its borders, given the country’s outsized role in global emissions. It also fits a broader pattern of climate progress being made at scale around the world.
Grid bottlenecks are the next challenge
The rapid expansion of renewable energy is also exposing a structural weakness: China’s electricity grid cannot always absorb all the power that wind and solar farms produce. This forces renewable projects to curtail output — clean electricity that is generated but never used.
Solar utilization fell to 91.4% in the first half of 2025 C.E., down from 94.3% a year earlier. Wind utilization slipped to 90.9%, from 93.5%. Those are not catastrophic figures, but the trend is moving in the wrong direction as capacity outpaces grid capacity.
Beijing is investing heavily to close that gap. Grid infrastructure spending rose 14% in the first half from a year earlier. Energy storage investment climbed 74%. Battery systems are also being used more intensively: they averaged 1,195 hours of operation in 2025 C.E., nearly double their level in 2023 C.E.
China’s role in the global energy picture
China is simultaneously the world’s largest coal consumer and its largest producer of renewable energy. That paradox has defined its energy story for years. The country has spent years expanding wind and solar while keeping coal central to its grid to prevent electricity shortages — a pragmatic hedge that is now beginning to visibly shift.
Global energy analysts at Ember have tracked China’s renewable build-out as one of the fastest in history. The country has already reached one terawatt of installed solar capacity, a world first. Its wind fleet is equally massive. The question now is whether the grid can be upgraded fast enough to make full use of the clean electricity being produced.
Internationally, the ripple effects are significant. The International Energy Agency has noted that China accounts for the majority of global renewable capacity additions in recent years. When China’s energy mix shifts, the global carbon accounting shifts with it. Energy market analysts have pointed to China’s clean power expansion as a key variable in whether global emissions peak this decade.
A milestone, not a finish line
The drop below 50% is real and meaningful. It reflects a decade of sustained investment, policy commitment, and industrial scale that no other country has matched in renewable deployment. Wind and solar generating nearly a quarter of the country’s electricity — in the world’s largest electricity market — is a number worth pausing on.
But coal use in China is still rising in absolute terms. The share has fallen; the volume has not. Closing that gap — actually reducing the amount of coal burned, not just its percentage — remains the harder task ahead. Grid modernization, energy storage, and demand-side flexibility will all have to scale alongside generation if China’s transition is to translate into real emissions reductions.
For now, a symbolic line has been crossed for the first time. That matters — both as evidence of what is possible and as a marker of how much further the work has to go.
Read more
For more on this story, see: Financial Post / Bloomberg
For more from Good News for Humankind, see:
- Ethiopia becomes one of the first countries to ban fossil fuel vehicle imports
- China becomes the first country to reach one terawatt of solar power
- The Good News for Humankind archive on renewable energy
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