CHINA is seeking to build up export markets for its power amid signs the nation has invested too much in new generation plants.

    State Grid Corp. of China, which runs the majority of the nation’s electricity distribution network, is considering how to build links to India, South Korea, Japan and Southeast Asia, a move that would require billions of dollars of investment in long-distance, high-voltage power lines.

    Interconnections would allow grid managers throughout the region to more flexibility use variable supplies coming from wind and solar farms cropping up from Vietnam to Mongolia. For China, the links would provide customers for power from hundreds of power plants finished in the past few years as demand in its domestic market stagnates.

    “We can export to India and Southeast Asia where the power supply is inadequate,” Zhang Qiping, chief engineer of State Grid, said Tuesday at a conference hosted by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) in Shanghai.

    China, which is the world’s biggest investor in fossil-fuel generation, started more than 70 gigawatts of new coal projects last year and had 200 gigawatts under construction at the end of April, the Paris-based International Energy Agency said in September. At the same time, most plants are sitting idle more than half the time, and low-carbon sources of electricity including nuclear and renewables are covering additional demand.

    At the BNEF conference in Shanghai, energy policymakers from China, Thailand and Mongolia spoke about the merits of building a regional network of power interconnections.(SD-Agencies)