China sets its first renewable standards for steel, cement and polysilicon

China has for the first time set renewable energy mandates for the steel, cement, and polysilicon industries, as well as for some data centres, according to a National Development and Reform Commission notice on Friday.

Beijing's renewable portfolio standards, or RPS, set out targets for the percentage of power consumption that the various industries must obtain from renewables in each province.

Previously the RPS only affected companies involved in power trading and the electrolytical aluminium industry, said David Fishman, principal at the Lantau Group, an energy-focused consultancy in an online post.


"Simply put: heavy industry must buy green," Fishman wrote of the new regulations.

Newly built data centres in so-called national hub nodes must use at least 80% green electricity, while targets for the other industries vary by province. The RPS targets are closely watched by market participants, said Yan Qin, principal analyst at ClearBlue markets in an online post, because they are used to calculate the amount of renewable power generation that will be incorporated into China's new contract for difference mechanism, which represents a move toward market-based pricing for renewables.

Under that mechanism, the government pays back generators if market prices fall below a set level.

The non-data centre targets are further divided into hydro renewables and non-hydro renewables. For 2025, the total renewable target is as high as 70% for hydropower-rich Yunnan province, for example, and as low as 24.2% for Fujian. The non-hydro targets cap out at 30% in wind and solar heavy provinces like Inner Mongolia, Gansu, and Qinghai, while mountainous Chongqing has a target of just 10.8%.

Targets for 2026 were also released as part of the plan; the targets typically rise a few percentage points each year.