In the world of energy production, we know that utilities will tend to use the lowest cost production, which is why when coal prices increased, many utilities switched to gas plants. There were other reasons, if you produce electricity with coal, the burning of the coal emits excessive carbon dioxide, and one hopes the wind continually blows the air to disperse the carbon to a wider area. However, there will be excessive carbon produced. If a city is a bowl-shaped environment similar to LA and Beijing, on good days there are many wonderful reasons to live there, on days when the wind does not disperse the air, smog grows. If you think about the novels on Sherlock Holmes concerning London, there was smog in the air (people were burning coal in their homes). Change of heating source, changed the air.

In an article by Ken Moritsugu of the Associated Press, approvals for new coal-fired power plants in China has dropped according to analysis by Greenpeace East Asia. 14 new coal plants were approved between January and June with a total capacity of 10.3 gigawatts down 80% from 50.4 gigawatts in the same time last year.

In 2022, authorities approved 90.7 gigawatts and in 2023 106.4 gigawatts.

At the same time, China leads the world in solar and wind power installations.

In turns of extreme weather events, the Ministry of Water Resources said there were 23 significant floods this year. As well as China had landslides which can about because of flash flooding.

Seasonal flooding is common in southern China, the historically drier northeast and areas bordering on North Korea are beginning to get heavier amounts of rain. This causes floods and cut power and communications in Jianchang.

The National Energy Administration has unveiled a 3-year program to retrofit existing coal power units and equip newly built ones with low-carbon technologies. Coal provides 60% of China’s of the country’s electricity.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, there are always tradeoffs in the production process and ideally for citizens they would like to have the less mitigating circumstances as possible. Sometimes it is possible but expensive, sometimes it is overlooked and hoped the environment can absorb and clean up the process and sometimes it is costly after the lawsuits. It is a balancing act for margins and government actions or inactions.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.