GONGHE, China — On the Tibetan Plateau, nearly 10,000 feet above sea level, solar panels stretch to the horizon and cover an area seven times the size of Manhattan. They capture much more intense sunlight than at sea level, due to the thin air.
Wind turbines dot nearby ridges and line up in long rows over arid, desert plains, above occasional shepherds with their flocks. They take advantage of night breezes, balancing the energy generated by solar panels during the day. Hydroelectric dams are located where rivers tumble through long gorges on the edges of the plateau. High-voltage transmission lines carry all this electricity to businesses and homes more than 1,000 miles away.
China is building a huge network of clean energy industries on the Tibetan plateau, the highest in the world. The intention is to take advantage of the intense sun, low temperatures and high altitude to provide low-cost renewable energy. The result is enough to supply almost all of the plateau’s electrical demand, including data centers used in the development of artificial intelligence in the country.
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Although it still burns as much coal as the rest of the world combined, last month President Xi Jinping made a surprising promise. In a speech at the UN, he stated for the first time that the country will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions throughout the economy and increase its renewable energy capacity six-fold in the coming years. It was a moment of global relevance for the nation that is the biggest polluter on the planet.
The Chinese efforts contrast with U.S. policy under the Trump administration, which uses diplomatic and economic influence to pressure other countries to buy more American gas, oil and coal. China, in turn, is investing in cheaper solar and wind technology, as well as batteries and electric vehicles, with the aim of becoming a global supplier of renewable energy and the products that depend on it.
The main cluster of solar plants, known as the Talatan Solar Park, dwarfs any other cluster of solar farms in the world. It covers 420 km² in Gonghe County, a sparsely inhabited alpine desert in western China’s Qinghai province.
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No other country uses high altitudes for solar, wind and hydropower on a scale comparable to that of China on the Tibetan Plateau. The project is an example of how the country has come to dominate the future of clean energy. With strong state investment and planning, electricity companies are reducing dependence on imported oil, gas and coal — a national priority.
Renewable energy helps China operate 30,000 miles of high-speed train lines and its growing fleet of electric cars. At the same time, cheap electricity makes it possible to manufacture even more solar panels, which dominate the global market and power artificial intelligence data centers.
Solar and wind energy in Qinghai, which occupies the northern third of the Tibetan plateau, costs about 40% less than that generated by coal. The province covers much of the region known among Tibetans as Amdo and includes the birthplace of the current Dalai Lama, now in exile.
In July, Premier Li Qiang participated in the ceremony to begin work on five new dams on the Yarlung Tsangpo River, in southern Tibet, a region heavily controlled by the Communist Party and closed to Western journalists. Little information has been released, but the work is expected to take years and result in the largest hydroelectric project in the world. The construction worries India, which fears China could cut off water supplies to downstream areas in eastern India.
China is not the first country to experiment with clean energy at high altitudes, but other places as high as the Tibetan Plateau are mountainous and steep. Qinghai, slightly larger than Texas, is mostly flat — ideal for solar panels and the roads needed to transport them. Cold air also increases the efficiency of the panels.
The Talatan project is located on sandy soil with sparse vegetation, used as pasture by Tibetan herders. The first panels, placed in 2012, were so close to the ground that they made it difficult for sheep to graze. Now, they are all mounted on taller structures, according to Liu Ta, project manager.
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Deploying people to energy projects is politically sensitive around the world. But, in areas of high altitude and low population density, the impact is smaller. Twenty-five years ago, China removed more than 1 million people from their homes in the country’s central west to create the Three Gorges Dam reservoir. This year, the country has installed enough solar panels every three weeks to equal the generation capacity of this dam.
Generating wind energy on the plateau is more complex. At high altitudes, winds are strong, but the thin air does not move turbine blades as efficiently as denser air at sea level.
Still, the region is home to many turbines. Electric grid operators seek to balance solar generation during the day with wind generation at night, keeping voltage stable and avoiding blackouts.
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Qinghai province sends surplus solar energy to Shaanxi in west-central China. In return, it supplements local wind power at night with small amounts of electricity generated by coal-fired power plants in Shaanxi.
Additionally, Qinghai increasingly turns to hydropower to balance solar production while reducing the use of coal power.
More than a decade ago, eight dams were built on the Yellow River, which drops a thousand meters as it leaves the plateau towards eastern China. Others are under construction to complement solar energy generated in the province.
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“When photovoltaic power is insufficient, I can use hydropower to compensate,” said Zhu Yuanqing, director of the energy division of the Qinghai Energy Bureau.
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