Even with its unmatched arsenal of turbines, China still lags the United States. It said this month that it intended to spend at least $360 billion through 2020 on developing renewable energy sources. “This is partly a political fight,” said Paolo Frankl, head of the renewable energy division at the International Energy Agency. Advocates for the wind industry contend that local officials have reduced production quotas for wind farms to give an advantage to coal companies. At the Jiuquan Wind Power Base, Mr. Zhou oversees a small wind farm for a branch of China Resources Power Holdings, a state-run energy company based in Shenzhen that operates two wind farms in Gansu.

Source: New York Times January 15, 2017 23:18 UTC