page_title: Electricity sector in China
section_title: Transmission infrastructure
hierarchical_section_title: Electricity sector in China / Transmission infrastructure
caption_attribution_description: Photograph of a sign advertising the Tibet Power company. The text reads: "西藏电力; TIBET POWER; བོད་ལྗོངས་གློག་ཤུགས་ཀུང་སིས་བསྒྲགས། (bod ljongs glog shugs kung sis bskrags); 西藏电力公司 宣"
context_page_description: China's electric power industry is the world's largest electricity producer, passing the United States in 2011 after rapid growth since the early 1990s.
  Most of the electricity in China comes from coal, which accounted for 66% of the electricity generation mix in 2016. Coal-fired electricity production declined from 2013 to 2016 coinciding with a major boom in renewable energy, and a decline in GDP growth. China's coal powered generating capacity is expected to increase to 1300 gigawatt by 2020, from 960 GW in 2016, despite official plans to limit that growth to 1100 GW.
  China has two wide area synchronous grids, the State Grid and the China Southern Power Grid.
  The northern power grids were synchronized in 2005.
  Since 2011 all Chinese provinces are interconnected.
  The two grids are joined by HVDC back-to-back connections.
  China has abundant energy with the world's third-largest coal reserves and massive hydroelectric resources.
  There is however a geographical mismatch between the location of the coal fields in the north-east and north, hydropower in the south-west, and the fast-growing industrial load centers of the east and south.
context_section_description: The central government has made creation of a unified national grid system a top economic priority to improve the efficiency of the whole power system and reduce the risk of localised energy shortages. It will also enable the country to tap the enormous hydro potential from western China to meet booming demand from the eastern coastal provinces. China is planning for smart grid and related Advanced Metering Infrastructure.
caption: Tibet Power is the company that manages power in Tibet, and is controlled by the State Grid Corporation.
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