China to Accelerate Hydropower Projects Over Next 5 Years

Industrial Info Resources reports that China will give top priority to hydropower with construction on more than 60 large-scale hydropower stations to begin by 2015, according to the new Twelfth Five-Year Plan to be published soon.

According to this plan, Industrial Info reports China will have eight large-scale, 10-gigawatt (GW) hydropower bases in operation, and the country”s annual hydropower output will reach 910 billion kilowatt-hours. This is an increase from six-GW hydropower bases previously predicted. According to Industrial Info, the approvals process for hydropower projects has accelerated since the beginning of this year.

It”s expected that the newly commissioned capacity of hydropower during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan will reach about 87.5 GW, Industrial Info reports. By the end of 2015, the total installed capacity of conventional hydropower in China will reach about 284 GW, accounting for about 71 percent of the total exploitable capacity.

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