In May 2025, China installed 92.9 gigawatts of new solar capacity in a single month, according to Carbon Brief. That roughly equals all of Germany's solar capacity, which Germany built up over more than twenty years. By year end, renewable energy in China crossed the 60 percent mark of installed electricity generation capacity for the first time, the Chinese government reported in late January 2026.
Greatest renewable energy expansion ever
By end of 2025, China had 640 gigawatts of installed wind capacity and 1,200 gigawatts of solar capacity. Adding hydropower and other renewables brings the total renewable capacity to over 2,280 gigawatts. For comparison: in 2020 it was still around 900 gigawatts.
Electricity generation from renewables reached roughly 4 trillion kilowatt hours in 2025 according to government figures. That exceeds the total electricity consumption of all 27 EU states, which amounts to roughly 3.8 trillion kilowatt hours. In February 2026, clean electricity surpassed fossil fuels in monthly generation for the first time: renewables accounted for 52 percent of actual electricity production.
Ninety solar panels per second: May 2025
Particularly striking was May 2025: In that month alone, China installed 92.9 gigawatts of new solar capacity according to Carbon Brief. At 400 watts per standard panel, that equals roughly 90 panels per second, continuously over 31 days. No other country in the world has ever recorded such monthly growth.
The background was a subsidy system change: Those who connected systems to the grid by end of May still benefited from old feed-in tariffs. This triggered an installation rush. The second half of the year was markedly quieter: in August 2025 China installed only 7.4 gigawatts. Over the full year, China grew its solar capacity by 35 percent to 1,200 gigawatts and its wind capacity by 23 percent to 640 gigawatts.
In comparison: What 430 gigawatts in one year means
Germany had just under 190 gigawatts of total installed renewable capacity by end of 2024 according to the Federal Network Agency: 73 gigawatts wind, 99 gigawatts solar, and roughly 14 gigawatts from water and biomass. China's new additions in 2025 alone exceeded this entire value more than twice over.
The European Union as a whole has roughly 520 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity. China's wind and solar capacity totals 1,840 gigawatts and exceeds this more than threefold. The US had around 279 gigawatts of installed solar capacity by end of 2025. In this category alone, China has four times that amount.
A historical comparison: Denmark is considered a pioneer of energy transition and already covers over 80 percent of its electricity needs from renewables. Denmark achieves this with installed capacity under 20 gigawatts. China demonstrates that the same principle of consistent wind and solar expansion applies at the scale of a billion-person industrial economy.
Coal and curtailment as open flanks
Despite record numbers, structural constraints exist. Electricity demand is growing rapidly in China: industry, data centers, and the electric vehicle boom drive consumption. Meanwhile, China approved coal power plants with roughly 50 gigawatts of new capacity in 2024, more than any year since 2015. Renewables and coal are growing in parallel currently.
Another problem is curtailment: Many solar parks emerge in China's northwest, yet transmission infrastructure to densely populated coastal cities still lacks in places. Finished installations produce electricity that cannot be fully utilized. Internationally, EU and US tariffs on Chinese solar modules create uncertainty on the export side, though they have an unintended side effect for domestic expansion: modules that cannot be exported lower domestic prices and make new projects more profitable.
If the pace holds: China toward 70 percent
If China maintains expansion at the 430-gigawatt-per-year level, installed wind and solar capacity would reach roughly 2,700 gigawatts by 2027. That would be more than five times the entire wind and solar capacity in the EU. Whether this value is realistic depends mainly on two factors: expansion of high-voltage transmission lines connecting generation and consumption regions, and political will to actually decommission the coal power plant fleet.
For climate, installed capacity alone doesn't matter. What counts is electricity that actually displaces fossil fuels. The step from 60 percent capacity share to 60 percent generation share requires grids and storage currently not growing at the same pace as solar parks themselves.