From coal to clean: One man's journey

During his three years of studying electrical engineering and automation at an engineering college in Jiamusi, Heilongjiang province, Xiao Lijia acquired only limited knowledge of new energy power generation from textbooks. He never thought he would have a career in the industry.

Now, as a senior electrical engineer at the Northeast Branch of China Three Gorges New Energy Co, he has participated in the construction and operation of more than 10 wind and solar power plants in Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning provinces.

"After graduating from senior high school in 1992, I chose to focus on electricity in college because I was told it would be easier for graduates to get jobs," said the 47-year-old engineer. "And it was true. I was assigned to the Hegang coal-fired power plant in Heilongjiang province as a technician after graduation in 1995."

"At that time, the plant was under construction and would be the second-largest power plant in the province," he said. "With the growing demand for electricity－accompanied by social and economic development since reform and opening-up policies were launched in the late 1970s－the country accelerated the construction of power plants."

In the eyes of Xiao's family members and friends, he had entered a booming industry.

"After five years' work as an inspector of the electrical indicator system, I became an engineer in the electric power system protection department, which is the most important part of power generation," he said. "To ensure production, the plant began to update its power generation facilities starting in 2004."

"After only a few years of development, the new domestically produced equipment had become more advanced, which greatly helped improve production efficiency," Xiao said, noting that he participated in the update of the entire system. "Furthermore, the price was much lower than the imported brands."

He clearly recalled the astonishing coal consumption of the power plant: The plant was built in a major coal-producing province, and every day coal was transported by trains and trucks to the coal storage yard and generated a lot of dust. "It is still a great challenge to improve the surrounding environment," he said.

Still, the power plants solved the problem of intermittent power outages experienced during the 1980s.

Since the Bashang region in Zhangjiakou was approved as China's first wind power base in 2007, new energy entered a rapid development stage.

"It put China at the forefront of the world in clean power generation, which gave me the idea of searching for a larger development space," Xiao said.

In October 2010, he quit the job he had been engaged in for 15 years and became a member of the Northeast Branch of China Three Gorges New Energy Co, which had just started business a month earlier.

"It was really a new industry for me, even though the past decade's work provided useful experience," he said. "Site selection, for instance, should be a long-term and complicated process."

The company, which is involved in wind and solar power generation in the three northeastern provinces, has built 14 power plants.

"It takes at least a year to gather data about wind and solar energy at the selected sites before construction can proceed," he said. "We also take environmental protection into consideration to avoid harming forests and basic farmland."

The National Energy Administration said the total installed renewable energy capacity had reached 650 million kilowatts at the end of 2017, up 14 percent from 2016. Clean energy generated 1.7 trillion kWh of electricity last year, accounting for 26.4 percent of the country's total.

"As China promotes green development, clean energy is thriving in the country, reducing dependence on coal," Xiao said. "The information provides us great confidence for future development."

There is an interesting tradition at the company, Xiao said.

"Young staff members like to take their wedding photos at the feet of the huge power-generating windmills," he said.

"The windmills seem like a strong power that will bring us a bright future."