On April 26, the 8th Wind Power Development Seminar in the Middle East and South of China and the Wind Power Development Forum of "Wind Control Action in Thousands of Towns and Villages" were successfully held in Nanning, Guangxi. Chen Yongsheng, Director of the New and Renewable Energy Department of the National Energy Administration, Xiong Xiangzhong, Member of the Party Leadership Group of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Development and Reform Commission, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Energy Bureau of the Autonomous Region, Tian Qingjun, Senior Vice President of Envision Group, and Qin Haiyan, Secretary-General of the Wind Energy Professional Committee of the China Renewable Energy Society, delivered speeches at the conference. More than 800 government and enterprise guests, academicians and experts from national ministries and commissions, local governments, provincial and municipal energy bureaus, and development enterprises gathered in Greentown to discuss the way of rural wind power to promote rural revitalization.
Tian Qingjun said that from firewood to coal, electricity, natural gas to distributed photovoltaics, the form of rural energy use is becoming more and more clean and convenient, with the advancement of wind power and energy storage, every household in the village will achieve energy self-sufficiency, and the inexhaustible green electricity can also be sold online to generate income, and the villagers will transform from simple energy consumers to energy producers and beneficiaries, which will be an exciting change of the times. China's energy revolution can only be truly realized when the vast rural areas achieve energy self-sufficiency and green transformation.
As an important part of China's wind power, rural wind power will play a huge role in this rural energy revolution and rural revitalization. Taking Guangxi as an example, if the 14,000 villages here can install 20,000 kilowatts of wind turbines in the most ideal state, the total installed capacity of wind power in the countryside of the whole region will reach 280 million kilowatts, and more than 600 billion kilowatts of green electricity will be produced every year, which is equivalent to the annual power generation of the six Three Gorges hydropower stations, even if it is discounted by 300 billion kilowatts, it will also exceed the 244.94 billion kilowatts of electricity consumption of the whole society in Guangxi in 2023.
Tian Qingjun said that the action of thousands of villages and towns is at the right time, and the countryside can not only provide high-quality and low-cost agricultural and sideline products to the city, but also provide green and cheap electricity to the city in the future, becoming the center of urban energy supply. Planting crops and "wind turbines", producing both food and "green electricity", self-sufficiency, surplus electricity to get rich, "six factors determine the bright future of rural wind power, which is expected to open up a new growth pole for the wind power industry." ”
First, China's wind power technology is mature and its products are abundant. In the past few years, 50 million to 70 million kilowatts of new wind power capacity has been added every year, forging an incomparably mature wind power industry chain, which is enough to support the large-scale and differentiated development of rural wind power.
Second, rural wind power has a lower LCOE and better profits. The EPC cost of rural wind power projects in some parts of the mainland is expected to reach 3,000 yuan/kW, and the cost of electricity is expected to be less than 2 cents, which is more cost-competitive and more secure than centralized wind power.
Third, rich experience in development and operation. Over the years, China Wind Power has accumulated a lot of practical experience in the development and construction of onshore centralized and large-scale base projects in batches, which can be reused in rural wind power, so that rural wind power development can avoid detours and save costs.
Fourth, the power reform is effectively supported. With the deepening of the reform of the power system, the power market is becoming more and more mature, which has laid a good foundation for rural wind power to participate in electricity market-oriented transactions and expand consumption channels in the future. The positioning of rural wind power must not be confined to local consumption, but should be positioned as a producer and provider of urban energy.
Fifth, policy support is unprecedented. In recent years, the state has successively put forward three national policies: "rural revitalization", "dual carbon" goals, and rural energy revolution, and rural wind power is an ideal carrier to achieve these three strategic goals, with extremely high comprehensive benefits. The just-issued "Notice on Organizing and Carrying out the "Wind Control Action in Thousands of Towns and Villages" is a shot in the arm.
Sixth, the development of wind power has entered a new stage, and the development of rural wind power is a matter of course. Over the past 20 years, China's wind power has developed simultaneously on land and sea, unlocking various development scenarios, and rural wind power is the last piece of the puzzle. In the future, rural wind power will become one of the "wind power troikas" in the new era, along with onshore bases and offshore wind power.
▲Guangxi Cangwu Liubao Wind Power (Phase I) Project, installing 20 Envision Energy intelligent wind turbines
After the release of the new policy, some provinces in the southern Middle East where the development of onshore wind power is slow or even stagnant, are also paying attention to and judging the possibility of developing rural wind power, and it is expected that Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong and other places may release a number of development indicators one after another, which is expected to open a huge market with a scale of hundreds of millions of kilowatts. Shandong, Henan, Guangxi, Sichuan and other regions that are vigorously developing wind power will also take advantage of this policy to set off a new upsurge in wind power development.
At the same time, we should also rationally see that rural wind power is still facing many challenges, how to solve the blockages and pain points that have always been solved?
First, it is imperative to upgrade and transform the rural network. At present, there is not much space left in the rural distribution network, and there is no way to meet the access needs of a large number of rural wind power, especially in the past three years when distributed photovoltaic took the lead in "promoting the whole county", which has occupied a large amount of power grid space, and the upgrading and transformation of rural power grids must be accelerated.
Second, break the limit of the voltage level of the Internet. At present, distributed wind power can only be connected to the power grid at a maximum of 110KV, resulting in a consumption radius of 20 kilometers, which is quite a constraint on rural wind power. It is necessary to break the voltage level limit of 110KV and let rural wind power go further and send more.
Third, the reform of the electric power system has gone further, and the sale of electricity through the walls has been fully opened. Promote the market-oriented operation of rural wind power, realize the direct signing of power sales contracts between developers and users, and let rural wind power serve more electricity consumption groups and enrich application scenarios. Peasants' grain and vegetables can be freely traded in the market, instead of being sold only to supply and marketing cooperatives.
Fourth, simplify the project approval procedures and truly implement the filing system. In 2017, Envision developed and built the country's first truly distributed wind power project in Jiangyin, and at that time, in order to erect a wind turbine, the procedures were very complicated, requiring a large number of departments to approve and demonstrate. On the other hand, distributed photovoltaic has taken off rapidly under the empowerment of the filing system, and now it has "one of two parts of the world" in the photovoltaic industry. Distributed wind power, which started earlier, is still a small supporting role in the wind power industry, accounting for less than 2%.
Fifth, rent instead of levy to solve the pain points of land use. It is difficult to change the nature of land and there are many restrictions on land acquisition, resulting in a high threshold for wind power development. In the future, rural wind power can be developed in the form of land leasing without changing the nature of the land, with reference to the construction methods of transmission and distribution facilities and communication facilities, so that a large number of seats can be quickly released.
Sixth, create extremely reliable and environmentally friendly wind turbines. Rural areas are scattered, densely populated, and ecologically sensitive, especially for noise control, safety and reliability, which is actually the direction of fan technology progress. Envision Jiangyin Distributed Wind Power Project was put into operation at the end of 2017 and has been in safe and stable operation for 7 years, accumulating valuable experience in noise control, intelligent protection, and environmental friendliness.
Seventh, explore the integration of wind, solar, storage and charging. In recent years, with the large-scale development of photovoltaic and electric vehicles to the countryside, supporting charging piles and energy storage are also going to the countryside simultaneously, the outbreak of rural wind power will cooperate with photovoltaic to further activate the charging and storage market, and the integrated development of wind, solar, storage and charging is logical, which will create a new track of trillions of yuan.
It is gratifying that the national authorities have accurately identified these unfavorable factors restricting the development of rural wind power, and are working to solve them - the new policy proposes to "explore the trial filing system", "explore the acquisition of land by leasing and other means", "power grid enterprises implement guaranteed grid connection", etc., let us see the possibility of reversing the long-standing popularity of rural wind power. In fact, the granularity of rural wind power is much greater than that of photovoltaics, which is more suitable for "county-wide development".
However, if rural wind power, the "broken gold" of China's wind power, wants to truly shine, it is necessary to refine and introduce highly operable implementation policies to ensure that the policy objectives are transmitted to the provincial, municipal and county governments step by step. Only with clear and targeted policies can we turn developers' enthusiasm into concrete action and promote the steady and long-term development of rural wind power, and we look forward to this day as soon as possible.
Text丨Zhong Xinyuan
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