China Urges Coal Sector to Speed Up Energy Efficiency

China’s top economic planning agency has told its coal sector to accelerate energy-saving and emission-control measures, offering preferential access to power grids and lower taxes as incentives.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said in a statement issued late on Thursday that coal firms should cut their energy consumption per ton by 20 percent from 2005 levels by 2010, as part of a national drive to reduce the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. Coal-fired power plants should increase the use of coal waste to account for 70 percent of electricity generation by 2010, up from 43 percent in 2005, the NDRC said on its Web site (www.ndrc.gov.cn).
Power stations should also use 60 percent of coal bed methane by 2010, the agency said.

Power plants that meet these targets would be given preferential access to the power grids while miners that achieve higher energy efficiency will be given tax incentives, said the NDRC.

The Chinese government has been struggling to curb pollution from the factories, mines and industrial plants that have driven frantic growth. China has promised to cut emissions of major pollutants by 10 percent between 2006 and 2010, but last year the country failed to meet the annual target.

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