Green China: Beijing’s Fossil Fuel Tech Dominance Explained
It is already a well -known fact that the struggle for global leadership in the political and economic sense is today between the US and China. Although China is still officially identified as a developing country, as well as the United States, we can allocate the status of a superpower.
All other global actors are more or less lagging behind this pair, and we can say that this lag is deepening.
This is especially true for Europe, respectively. The European Union if we want to compare the old continent with these two countries in terms of a political and economic whole.
From our point of view, we therefore focus primarily on the position of the EU we are part of Slovakia, in relation to the main topic of this text – the Chinese position in the Green Transformation.
Green transformation is sometimes rightly, sometimes wrongly criticized for its too much ideological. However, in the pragmatic world of global political and economic relations, this is primarily one of the other extraordinary economic opportunities that have the potential to move the focus of economic development and innovation, as we see on the example of China.
And here it should be emphasized that the ideological charge gave the so -called. The European Union, which is lagging behind not only against China but also against the US, is a green transformation.
Green transformation is itself an euphemism, as it is not more environmentally friendly compared to the dominant fossil fuels. Therefore, in order to avoid the risk of greenwashing, post -fossil technology is more suitable for this transformation.
China invests more than everyone else together
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The EU will come out of this three as a poor relative, even when comparing real investments in new technologies associated with green transformation.
The volume of Chinese investments for 2024 is estimated At around $ 940 billion – this includes renewable energy sources, electric transmission, batteries and electric vehicles. According to BloombergNEF Last year, Chinese investments in these sectors were two thirds of global investments ($ 2.1 billion).
In the USA made up Last year, investment in “pure” energy and transport in the green transformation segment of $ 272 billion.
Investments in the EU are difficult to specify for more specific segments. The European Central Bank statedthat between 2011 and 2022, the country of the Union has invested an average of EUR 764 billion per year in this area, but this amount includes total measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, so it cannot be identified with the volume of investments in the new technologies themselves.
While EU countries have invested an average of EUR 764 billion per year, this amount includes total measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it cannot be identified with the volume of investments in the new technologies themselves.
More specific number for last year stated The European Investment Bank, which supported projects for more than EUR 100 billion in the area of modernization of networks, renewable sources, industrial decarbonation and energy storage.
The disproportion between China and the rest of the world is distinctive Also compared to a longer period of time.
Chinese government sources are praise By gaining more than 40 percent of the world’s patents in renewable technologies between 2021 and 2025, it also pushes the efficiency of photovoltaics and wind power plants. During this period it also built almost 17 million charging units for electromobility.
Along with the development, however, China also records negative consequences, respectively. that fast development leads to market overheating. For example, excessive capacities of solar power plants led in the first half of 2025 to the fact that six operating companies reported the total the loss of the loss of $ 2.8 billion, which required a central government intervention.
Despite the official ideology of Marxism and Communism, and the fact that the management political force in China is still a Communist Party, it is not a communism that we could remember before 1989 in our country.
Chinese competition
On the one hand, there is a total control of the life of an individual in China, which the Czechoslovak Communists would not seem even in the bravest dreams, which allow the Chinese comrades to implement modern technologies, expansion of social networks and artificial intelligence.
On the other hand, the economic system of China is more to the United States than on a rigid centralized system known from the time of Soviet central planning.
Although there are still a five -year or a year old and the basic tasks of plans are based on the central government in Beijing, but it implements these plans for a managed competition. In accordance with the basic philosophy, which is contained both in traditional Chinese thinking and in Marxism, respectively. Maoism – that the team and his interest is more than an individual and individual interest -, this competition is implemented by individual regions, respectively. Province.
Simply: the central government enters a project, selects suitable regions that have good conditions for its implementation – for example, enough of the appropriate workforce, energy sources, other raw materials or appropriate infrastructure – and these regions then implement the project.
The central government leaves the management of these projects, so to speak, they can try different procedures, explore and develop technologies, choose suitable subcontractors and the like. When the term that the central government has defined the project expires, regional structures will present their results.
And since the Chinese are economically extremely pragmatic, the winning project is not chosen according to the one who has friends in the Politburo, but according to whether it is economically effective and able to succeed in global competition.
Since the Chinese are economically extremely pragmatic, the winning project is not chosen according to the one who has friends in the Politburo, but whether it is economically effective and able to succeed in global competition.
China has enough resources, both human and financial, so that such “laboratories” can afford, including the fact that part of the funds will be commented, so to speak They serve to define “paths that do not marry”.
An example that is closely related to our topic and which shows the model testing first at the level of the region or province is the construction of the spot market for electricity. The spot market means immediate trading in electricity produced with coverage of demand, for example in half -hour slots.
The disadvantage is difficult to predict price development, but at the same time allows you to place almost all produced electricity in real -time electricity and at the same time in the event of lower demand operatively reduce the performance of flexible sources. This reduces the risk of instability in the transmission system.
Between 2021 and 2023, Beijing piloted the spot market in the provinces of Gans, Šen-Si and Kuang-Tung. In 2024, it was followed by testing the interpretational spot market and the deployment of pilot functioning in other provinces. By the end of this year China wants run Spot market throughout its territory.
In addition, since 2021, pilot programs have been underway in the areas of Beijing, Kanton and internal Mongolia. It is a combination of electricity prices and so -called. green certificatesthat is, green certificates. One certificate is equal to one MWh of “green” energy and at the same time a traded unit. The central government plans to gradually reduce the volume of subsidies to RES and set single market procedures. By 2030, green certificates are to become a full part of the spot markets throughout China.
By 2024 the volume of market trafficking with electricity grew up From 1.1 billion MWh (2016) to 6.2 billion MWh, market trade covers 63 percent of total consumption. Renewable sources account for up to 55 percent of traded volume.
Renewable energy sources in China account for up to 55 percent of the market -traded electricity.
According to official reports, China is therefore recording significant progress in these projects and the objectives set out is successful. However, there are still regional barriers among areas that primarily produce electricity (especially in the north), and regions with high consumption (especially in the east and south).
Therefore, in addition to the coordination of the market, Beijing also embarked on the construction of ultravyscoconapest networks. Their main practical advantage is that they make it possible to transmit larger volumes of electricity at lower transmission losses, which in China means thousands of kilometers from production to consumers. Beijing started building them in 2008 and 2009, the current range is estimated to be 40 to 48,000 kilometers.
If we compare it to the United States, there is also a laboratory that selects viable and effective ideas and approaches from those that lead to a blind alley. With the difference that these projects are primarily based on private funding in the US. And successful, the unsuccessful failure.
Externally, it is at first glance a cruel system, which ultimately moves sources where they produce results, and subsequently offers opportunities to those who have failed. People who have lost their jobs in unsuccessful projects then can work with their education and experience in the successful ones. This is also recorded by the natural mobility of people in the US, who are able to move thousands of kilometers from day to day to work.
Such mobility also exists in China, but there is totalitarianism. If the Communist Party needs thousands of people for a project, they simply move or set up another work camp. On the other hand, it should ban people in power to move.
On the one hand, the European Union lacks an open market space for the competition and projects competition, which is in particular input the extensive level of regulations and detailed reporting, on the other hand, it does not have unlimited political power, which would centrally and without delay decisions to allocate resources and projects.
The disadvantage of the EU towards China is poor action and narrower space for free competition. As a result, the most capable are to a large extent lured by the American market (which we know as a brain outflow in normal speech).
Parallel with development in AI
The EU is looking at both worlds from a distance and seems to be unable to decide which of these models to choose. She would like to create a kind of cat. The example is recent text The former head of the European Commission Representation in Slovakia Vladimír Šucha. Although he writes about artificial intelligence, it also applies in this segment, which is dominated by the US and China and the rest of the world, including Europe, is watching.
Shucha thinks that a European “third way” is possible, the EU will increase its investments and create its own AI infrastructure along with democratic Allies like Canada, Australia or Japan. It suggests that the EU will not be issued either the US path or the way of China, because “if the European model wins, you will live in a world where AI serves people, not the other way around. You will have the right to know how AI decides your life. You will be able to control and change AI systems.
It would sound naively with the right to a condescending smile, if one did not realize that it was written by the former Supreme Representative of the European Commission, which repeatedly comes with proposals that AI under the control of the authorities could read all of our electronic communication.
If this is what the future of AI in Europe is to look like, it is fortunate that the EU does not have sufficient capacity to balance the US and China technologically, and it remains to be hoped to finally prefer a “reckless” American model with all risks, but also freedom, over Chinese online concentration camp.
Raw materials first of all
The composition of the raw material base is more varied in the case of solar panels, wind power plants or electroats, unlike fossil technologies and, in addition to basic hardware (steel and aluminum), also requires a number of other raw materials in a significant proportion. Typically, in particular, copper, lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite or elements of rare soils, ie materials suitable for the production, transfer and storage of electricity.
An interesting comparison of material need can be seen when data for the production of car on fossil and electric drive from the International Energy Agency.
Of course, as in the case of fossil fuels, ie coal, oil and natural gas, nor the sources of metals, ie minerals, are not distributed evenly by the globe. There are countries that do not have almost any or minimal resources and where their mining and processing is economically unprofitable. And then countries that have rich sources of one or even several raw materials.
An example is neighboring Ukraine. Its natural wealth is the subject of the interest of Trump’s administration, and it is not so long since the US President made the continuation of the support of Ukraine in defense against Russia just with access to its mineral resources through the preferential granting of mining licenses. Ukraine has several materials that are used in post -foswed technologies.
There are only a few countries in the world. In South America we find large copper and lithium deposits (Chile, Bolivia). In the African Democratic Republic, the Cobalt deposits, the rich nickel supplies have Russia and the like.
Beijing has been more or less assertive in these areas for years and has managed to get a dominant approach to minerals. It is also worth mentioning that China was the largest foreign investor in Ukraine before the war, and it is unlikely that it did not climb even after mineral resources.
Russia fell into the arms of China, so to speak, effortlessly. After the attack of Ukraine, Moscow has already faced several rounds of sanctions that had been cut off from a large part of the trade with Western countries, and therefore did not hesitate to offer its raw materials to China. And since the Russians need to sell to have a war to finance the war, the prizes determine Beijing and Russia is increasingly becoming in fact The Chinese vassal (a significant part of the Russian Far East, especially Manchuska, is already capital in Chinese hands).
In many parts of the world, China has gained an exclusive approach to raw materials for new technologies at a time when they were in development “in its infancy”. Today he uses this lead.
If we only look at recent activities, in 2023 Chinese companies invested About $ 16 billion to buy mines, respectively. mining licenses abroad, which has been a maximum of the previous ten years (a copper mine in Afghanistan for five billion, a gold mine in Ghana for one billion and a preliminary contract with Zambia for $ 5 billion).
In 2024 Chinese acquisitions in the mining sector reached additional maximum – $ 21.4 billion on the initiative of the new Silk Road (Belt and Road Initiative).
According to the elders data Between 2000 and 2021, Chinese companies (of course, under the state patronage) invested $ 57 billion in mining and processing critical raw materials (copper, cobalt, nickel, lithium, rare soil) in developing countries.
Here, too, the difference in the Chinese and European approach should be aware of. Beijing does not follow the horizon of four- or five-year election periods. He thinks at least in the horizon of decades and investments that initially require strong dumping and go to continuous losses, and eventually bring profits in hundreds of billions.
China also has interesting supplies in its own territory. And in this context, for example, the absolute fantasy is that Beijing would ever give up Tibet, as demanded by the exile government of this former independent country headed by the Dalai Lama and what many activists in the world demand.
Tibet is a massive lithium reservoir. In addition, lithium with low -cost mining (extraction from salt lakes without the need for mining and processing of solid ores).
In addition, Tibet has interesting supplies for other important raw materials. In addition to the salt lakes, lithium is also found in sediments of geothermal springs. According to the previous surveys, their annual profitability is about 246 tons of lithium, 54 tons of rubidia, 233 tonnes of cesium and 2,747 tons of boron. These sources indicate The presence of deeper deposits, which will require so -called. hard-rock mining.
Access to raw materials is crucial for any industrial activity. The fact that it is said today about green transformation or post -fusful technologies does not change anything about this fact.
China benefits, invests, bills mines and promising deposits around the world, and has its own significant supplies with some kinds of minerals.
China benefits, invests, bills mines and promising deposits around the world, and has its own significant supplies with some kinds of minerals. And he uses them if he is going to use them.
It will be a repeated statement, but Europe has fallen asleep in this. Only relatively recently the EU has adopted a comprehensive strategy access to critical raw materials. At a time when a large part of the known deposits are already occupied.
It does not make the home soil, as it would cause massive protests to the public. And if he decides for acquisitions abroad, it also brings ideological training together with the economic investment. The investment is conditioned by the adoption of a variety of reproductive “rights” (understand abortion and contraception), LGBT agenda, quotas and other achievements of progressive policy.
But the third world countries are mostly interested in these collateral “benefits”. Wishing from countries where, for example, for homosexuality, it is still stable to work on implementing registered partnerships is absolutely misunderstanding of reality.
Although we perceive China as an ideological moloch, this comes to the third world with a clean business. If it adds to this “motivation” for local leaders, the answer to who will eventually benefit is clear.
A coal shadow
In spite of all the above, there is still a cloud (literally) of strong pollution over Chinese energy. This comes from coal -fired power plants, which still make up almost 60 percent of the production and supply of electricity in the country.
China consumes 35 percent of global annual coal consumption and continues to increase the installed power of coal power plants. In 2024, the construction of 94.5 GW of new coal -fired power plants began and in the first half of 2025 21 GW of installed power was added, which is the largest volume in the last ten years.
Coal is also relied on by China because it has enough of its own stocks, estimated at 143 billion tonnes, which is 13.3 percent of global stock. Coal, however, also dos – The year 2024 was record -breaking – the import was 542.8 million tonnes. Most of Russia, Australia, Mongolia and Indonesia.
To take China as a pattern?
The calculation of what China has done in the efforts of global dominance and leadership in new technologies associated with the so -called. Green transformation, in some moments it may sound like adoration of the system that this country uses to achieve its goal.
Many of the achieved, however, allows the totalitarian political system that exists in China, based on the synthesis of Marxism, respectively. Maoism, and traditional thinking emphasizing harmony as the basis of a functioning society. And it uses repressive tools to achieve this harmony.
It is also unprecedented by modern technologies – for example, a social credit system that makes public services to the “problematic” member of society, or ubiquitous cameras with facial recognition technology. Compared to the possibilities of modern technologically advanced totalitarian state, the Normalization practices of the StB are only a weak decoction.
So China’s economic growth and technological progress is stunning, but the question is whether we would be willing to replace these indicators for the loss of personal freedom and constant supervision of the authorities over every aspect of our lives.