<article><p class="lead">China's natural gas consumption will continue to grow in the next 10-15 years in line with the country's target for emissions to peak by 2030, according Chinese gas industry officials.</p><p>China's gas consumption is estimated to increase to 526bn m³ by 2030, then rise at a slower pace to peak at around 650bn m³ by 2035, said Tang Shanhua, an official from state-owned oil and gas pipeline firm PipeChina, at a conference this week. Consumption will fall to 550bn m³ by 2050, added Tang, whose estimates are based on multiple domestic studies. China's apparent gas consumption — domestic production plus imports — <a href="https://direct.argusmedia.com/newsandanalysis/article/2211256">reached 326.2bn m³ last year</a>, up by 7.2pc from 2019, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).</p><p>Chinese energy researchers have been scaling back long-term gas consumption forecasts following president Xi Jinping's pledge last year to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060. China's gas demand was previously predicted to peak at 700bn m³ by 2050, before it was revised down to around 535bn-605bn m³ by 2030 after Xi <a href="https://direct.argusmedia.com/newsandanalysis/article/2145419">made the pledge</a>, Hou Chuangye, vice-president of state-controlled PetroChina's gas sales unit, said in April. </p><p>Gas demand for power generation, other than burning, will account for most of the consumption growth in the future, Tang said. Other industry officials agreed that gas will play a major role as a flexible power source, providing firming power for volatile renewable energy sources like solar and wind, which will see a massive expansion over the next decades. </p><p>China's National Energy Administration (NEA) has set a target for <a href="https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news/2202143-china-sets-2025-target-for-renewable-power-capacity">renewable power to account for over 50pc</a> of total installed capacity by 2025. The combined share of wind, solar and hydropower was 41.2pc of China's total power output of 2,240GW as of last month. </p><p>Installed gas-fired capacity is expected to reach 150GW by 2025 with average annual growth of 9.6pc, according to the China Electricity Council (CEC). This compares with 97.5GW at the end of 2020 and 105.8GW last month.</p></article>
