China's Wind and Solar Capacity Passes Coal for First Time

China's installed wind and solar capacity moved above coal in 2025, the first time renewable capacity has outranked coal in the country's power mix, the state-run newspaper China Daily reported. Total power capacity reached 3,890 GW, according to a National Energy Administration data release covered by International Energy Net.

The shift came from a single year of fast build. Solar capacity rose 35% to 1,200 GW, wind climbed 23% to 640 GW, and thermal capacity, which is mostly coal, grew 6% to just over 1,500 GW. Wind and solar combined now sit above the thermal fleet, though thermal still outweighs either renewable source on its own.

Grid-related energy storage exceeded 213 GW in 2025, according to state news agency Xinhua. That fleet gives operators the means to time-shift renewable output across the evening ramp instead of curtailing it when wind drops or the sun sets.

Capacity is not the same as generation. Coal plants run far more hours per year than solar arrays, so the crossover in installed gigawatts leads the change in actual electricity supplied rather than confirming it. The China Electricity Council projects non-fossil sources could account for 63% of China's power mix in 2026, with coal falling to 31%. Coal's generation share, on the council's own numbers, stays material even as new build tilts toward renewables.

The economics behind the build run through national accounts. The Guardian, citing analysis for Carbon Brief, reported that clean-energy industries drove more than 90% of investment growth and more than half of GDP growth in China last year. With renewables now carrying the growth figures, the domestic case for slowing the build is thin.

The sharper test is dispatch. Coal capacity still grew 6% in 2025, so the fleet is expanding even as its projected share contracts. A power mix in which coal supplies 31% of generation against a larger installed base, as the China Electricity Council expects, points to lower utilization on those plants.

The storage figure is the variable that decides whether substitution happens or two parallel fleets simply grow side by side. Storage scaling past the 213 GW base reported by Xinhua keeps curtailment in check; storage lagging renewable build raises it.

Monthly generation data through 2026 will show whether the 63% non-fossil and 31% coal shares projected by the China Electricity Council hold or stall. A stall would mean the capacity crossover recorded in the National Energy Administration data had not yet reached the dispatch order.