Construction of major UHV project gets underway

China has broken ground on an ultra-high voltage transmission project, a key green artery designed to transmit massive amounts of renewable energy from the western parts of Inner Mongolia autonomous region to the industrial heartland of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province.

The 17.2 billion yuan ($2.4 billion) project, which started construction on Tuesday, is the first UHV line in Inner Mongolia specifically engineered to tap into the national strategy to build massive wind and solar bases in the country's vast sand, Gobi and desert regions, said its operator State Grid Corp of China.

The direct current line, spanning 700 kilometers with a transmission capacity of 8 million kilowatts, is expected to be put into operation by 2027, it said.

This UHV infrastructure is designed to bridge China's structural energy divide — a long-standing mismatch between the resource-abundant but sparsely populated west and the energy-hungry industrial hubs of the east and central regions.

To correct this imbalance, China has channeled massive capital into UHV networks, creating a continental-scale "power bridge" that facilitates the transition toward a green economy by prioritizing the delivery of renewables.

State Grid has accelerated its efforts to deploy high-capacity, long-distance conduits capable of transporting vast volumes of electricity with unprecedented efficiency.

"This project will significantly accelerate the large-scale development and efficient export of Inner Mongolia's new energy," said Jia Tikang, manager of the transmission project.

Jia said the project is slated to integrate 12 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity, providing a powerful impetus for the large-scale development and efficient export of Inner Mongolia's renewable energy.

This infrastructure is key to establishing a UHV "super channel" with a total export capacity exceeding 50 GW, thereby facilitating the optimized allocation of power resources on a national scale, he added.

Experts believed the project's landing point in Hebei is strategically significant, providing a robust supply of clean electricity to North China's load centers while facilitating a structural shift away from coal-heavy consumption once operational.

Zhou Xia, director-general of the center of power reliability management at the China Electricity Council, said China's power grid has ascended to the pinnacle of global sophistication following capital injection and technological breakthroughs.

The country has achieved a profound transformation in the security and resilience of its electrical infrastructure in recent years, setting new international benchmarks for operational stability, said Zhou.

Ye Xiaoning, a senior engineer at the new energy department of the State Grid Energy Research Institute, said China's persistent upgrades to its grid and transmission infrastructure have drastically improved the nationwide optimization of renewable energy resources.

The institute said China had established 42 UHV transmission lines by the end of last year, creating a resilient grid backbone.

According to State Grid, Inner Mongolia has rapidly consolidated its position as China's premier energy and strategic resource base.

Inner Mongolia has emerged as the definitive vanguard of energy transition with abundant solar and wind resources, serving to bridge the geographic mismatch between western resource abundance and the heavy electricity demand of eastern industrial hubs, it said.

Since the commissioning of its first UHV channel in 2016, the region has built a network of eight major corridors delivering power to coastal and central hubs.

To date, Inner Mongolia's UHV grid has transmitted over 830 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, with clean energy accounting for 116.5 billion kWh of that total.

Contact the writers at zhengxin@chinadaily.com.cn