Daniel Anastasoff

As an overseas Chinese who has worked on China’s energy transition and energy security for more than two decades, I’m tired of German commentators selectively using China and mis-represent China to fit a green narrative. Yes, China is building vast amounts of wind and solar. But unlike the permanent subsidy model some Germans still defend, China ended national feed-in tariffs for new solar and wind projects from June 2025. After more than twenty years of government support, these technologies are expected to compete in the market. At the same time, China is adding more coal capacity than the rest of the world combined, and building more nuclear reactors than the rest of the world combined. My generation and older generation of Chinese still remembers food and energy insecurity. We do not take modern industrial prosperity for granted. China’s approach has always centered on securing energy and food supply in a changing climate — not on treating intermittent renewables as an ideological end in themselves. That pragmatic multi-source approach is the actual story about China, not the misleading version currently circulating in Berlin by wind and solar lobbyists.