Is China Slowly Giving Up On Coal?
From Forbes
By Kenneth Rapoza
The Beijing skyline is pretty, when you can see it. Take a breathe of that fresh Shanghai air? No thank you. Poor air quality in China has the locals up in arms, and the government might actually be listening.
China is aiming to produce natural gas of around 50 million tons of coal equivalent (TCE) annually by 2020, a government guideline issued last week from the Ministry of Land and Resources and the National Energy Administration said.
By 2015, geothermal energy shall supply power of 20 million tons of TCE annually as China tries desperately — if not haphazardly — to kick its coal habit.
The country’s natural gas resources amount to 860 trillion metric tons of coal equivalent, an amount 260,000 times greater than China’s annual energy consumption, according to the Ministry of Land and Resources. Geothermal energy resources are abundant in China, although the country’s national companies do not have the know-how and technology to harvest those resources.
