China’s Sustainable Energy Future

The report analyzes three scenarios—Ordinary Effort, Promoting Sustainability, and Green Growth—to model China's energy demand and carbon emissions through 2020. It finds that while industry will remain the primary energy consumer, aggressive policies in energy efficiency, fuel switching to natural gas, and the expansion of renewables and nuclear power can significantly decouple GDP growth from energy consumption and carbon emissions. Specifically, the Green Growth scenario demonstrates that carbon emissions could increase by only 50% compared to more than doubling under a business-as-usual approach, provided there is substantial investment in clean energy infrastructure and rigorous enforcement of efficiency standards across the industrial, transportation, and building sectors.

• China could quadruple its GDP between 1998 and 2020 with primary energy use increasing by 70% to 130%, depending on the demand for energy services.
• The industrial sector will remain the largest energy consumer through 2020, accounting for 56% to 58% of all final energy.
• Depending on policy aggression, energy-related carbon emissions between 1998 and 2020 could either more than double or increase by only 50%.
• Coal will continue to be the dominant primary energy source through 2020, providing between 54% and 65% of China's energy.
• Oil demand is projected to grow annually by 3.3% to 4.6%, potentially leading to oil imports of 200 to 320 Mtoe per year by 2020.
• Natural gas consumption in 2020 is estimated to range from 4.5 EJ (120 bcm) to 7.3 EJ (190 bcm), representing 5% to 11% of final energy consumption.
• Transportation energy demand is expected to grow rapidly, with annual growth rates between 4.6% and 6.3% through 2020, dominated by freight transport (60% to 64% of the total).
• Building energy use is projected to grow by 4.4% to 5.9% annually, with space heating accounting for 54% of the sector's energy use.
• Sustainable electricity growth requires a diversified mix of technologies, including nuclear power (potentially reaching 40 GW by 2020 in the Green Growth scenario) and wind power (potentially reaching 30 GW by 2020).

APA

Stockholm Environment Institute (n.d.). China’s Sustainable Energy Future. https://cdn.leap.sei.org/documents/ChinaScenariosSummary.pdf

Chicago

Stockholm Environment Institute. China’s Sustainable Energy Future. n.d. https://cdn.leap.sei.org/documents/ChinaScenariosSummary.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Stockholm Environment Institute |title=China’s Sustainable Energy Future |url=https://cdn.leap.sei.org/documents/ChinaScenariosSummary.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stockholmenvironmentinstitutendchinas, author = {{Stockholm Environment Institute}}, title = {{China’s Sustainable Energy Future}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, url = {https://cdn.leap.sei.org/documents/ChinaScenariosSummary.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }