Asia’s RE capacity to hit 535 GW by 2020

China to lead renewable energy capacity increase.

Research from GlobalData said this large increase in renewable energy in Asia-Pacific will be driven by the rapid growth of the region’s late developing economies.

China is pushing hard to expand its usage of RE since its huge dependence on coal-fired plants for electricity has already created severe air pollution problems in its major cities.

By 2015, China will have an RE capacity of 130 GW. China hopes that 15% of its electricity will be generated from renewable sources by the 2020.

In 2013, China plans to add a total of 49GW in renewable energy capacity, of which 18GW will be derived from wind power and 10GW from solar power.

Other leading economies throughout Asia-Pacific will also make major contributions to RE growth including Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines and Thailand.

GlobalData expects the cumulative renewable installed capacity for China, India, Japan, Australia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines to rise at a compound annual growth rate of 12.2% during the period from 2012 and 2020.

Throughout the region as a whole, the percentage of power generated by renewable energy sources will rise from 12.1% in 2011 to nearly 20% in 2020.