GE Vernova and Harbin Electric said a 2 GW natural gas-fired power plant in China has gone into commercial operation, supplying power to that country’s most populous province. The companies announced on January 9 the start-up of the Guangming power plant, owned and operated by Chinese state-owned energy company Shenzhen Energy Group Corp. The plant, located in Shenzhen Guangming, a district in Guangdong province, is powered by three GE Vernova 9HA.01 gas turbines. About 127 million people live in Guangdong Province. The factory is the latest collaboration between GE Vernova and Shenzhen Energy Group, who have been working on projects together for twenty years, according to GE Vernova. The plant will help replace coal-fired power generation as China aims to peak carbon emissions by 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2060. Chinese officials have said the country has committed to partially reducing the share of coal in its energy mix by accelerating energy production. construction of efficient gas-fired combined cycle power stations, such as the Guangming plant. The companies said Thursday that the project also aligns with local government policy reforms in the Greater Bay Area, part of programs aimed at an energy transition from coal to gas.
This is a view of the 2-GW Guangming Power Plant in Guangdong Province, China. The plant is powered by three GE Vernova 9HA.01 gas turbines. Courtesy: GE Vernova “Natural gas-fired generators have the lowest CO2 emissions from all fossil fuels used for power generation, and are ideal for countries like China, where the need to transition away from coal on a large scale while maintaining supply reliability is paramount,” said Xu Xin, president of GE Vernova Gas Power China Services. “We are excited to partner with Harbin Electric and bring our advanced HA technology, which offers one of the lowest carbon emissions per amount of fossil fuels in the industry, to give power plant operators, such as Shenzen Energy Group, the ability to to use fuels more efficiently and with lower CO2 emissions compared to older coal-fired power stations.” The GE Vernova 9HA.01 gas turbine has the ability to burn up to 50 volume percent hydrogen when blended with natural gas, which the company says provides a path to even lower CO2 emissions operations. Harbin Electric supplied steam turbines and generators for the project. The gas turbines were supplied by the joint venture General Harbin Electric Gas Turbine (Qinhuangdao) Co., Ltd. This entity was formed in 2019 between GE Vernova and Harbin Electric as an effort to focus on the localization of heavy-duty gas turbines, with an aim to provide more efficient and reliable support to Chinese natural gas-fired power plants. GE Vernova has been active in China for more than 40 years. GE Vernova Gas Power serves more than 110 customers and more than 240 gas turbines in China, with an installed capacity of 50 GW. GE Vernova has so far won six HA projects with 13 gas turbines of 9HA in China, delivering a total capacity of almost 10 GW. —Darrel Proctor is a senior editor for POWER.
