Weekly Carbon News: The Competition in AI, from Computing Power to Energy (Carbon Report Issue 143)

Date: April 20, 2025
Author: Tao Ye

<h2>1. Key Carbon News</h2>

<h3>A. Policy Updates</h3>
<ol>
    <li>
        <b>Ministry of Ecology and Environment Releases Notification for 2025 National Carbon Emission Trading Market</b>
        On April 15, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment issued a notification regarding the management of the national carbon emission trading market for 2025. The notification emphasizes enhancing the management of the directory of key emission units, ensuring the quality of carbon emission data, and managing the allocation and settlement of carbon emission quotas.
        <br>
        The notification specifies that the directory of key emission units will be established annually by industry. Units in sectors such as power generation, steel, cement, and aluminum smelting with annual direct emissions reaching 26,000 tons of CO2 equivalent will be included in this directory. Provincial ecological environment authorities are responsible for compiling the directory of key emission units for 2024, 2025, and 2026, which will be subject to national carbon emission trading market management.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> Once key emission units are integrated into the national carbon trading market, they will no longer participate in local carbon emission trading for the same sector and type of greenhouse gases, thus avoiding overlapping regulations.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>First Guide for Product Carbon Footprint Label Certification Pilot Released</b>
        According to the National Market Supervision Administration, the first work guide for product carbon footprint label certification has been released. This guide, known as the "Knowledge Conference," combines practicality, clarity, timeliness, and authority, addressing common issues during the pilot process in a Q&A format to support the scientific, stable, and efficient advancement of the pilot project.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> Additionally, on March 17, the National Certification and Accreditation Administration published the "General Implementation Rules for Product Carbon Footprint Label Certification (Trial)," which clarifies the scope, certification model, and management requirements for product carbon footprint labeling. This marks a significant breakthrough in establishing a unified national product carbon labeling certification system.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>Ministry of Ecology and Environment: Six Industries with New Pollutants Face "One-Vote Veto"</b>
        On April 15, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment issued opinions regarding the environmental impact assessment of construction projects involving new pollutants in six key industries. The release clarifies that projects in industries such as petrochemicals, coatings, textile printing and dyeing, rubber, pesticides, and pharmaceuticals will face restrictions if they involve 14 types of new pollutants listed in the "Key Control New Pollutants List (2023 Edition)" and other regulated substances.
        <br>
        Any construction projects related to the production, processing, or use of prohibited new pollutants will face a "one-vote veto" and will not be approved.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> This policy aims to prevent the generation of new pollutants at the source, promoting the green transformation of related industries and ensuring ecological safety. New pollutants are defined as toxic and harmful chemicals with biological toxicity, persistence, and accumulation characteristics that are emitted into the environment. Current global concerns over new pollutants include persistent organic pollutants, endocrine disruptors, antibiotics, and microplastics. Unlike conventional pollutants such as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, new pollutants are continually increasing, and existing management measures are insufficient.
    </li>
</ol>

<h3>B. Industry Dynamics</h3>
<ol start="4">
    <li>
        <b>Wind Power Bidding Volume Doubles Year-on-Year in Q1, Turbine Prices Recover</b>
        According to incomplete statistics from Fengmang Energy, in the first quarter of 2025, 11 domestic wind turbine manufacturers won bids for 200 projects, totaling 33.27 GW (excluding annual framework projects and self-built projects), marking a year-on-year increase of 115.62%. The onshore wind bidding volume reached a new high at 32.42 GW, accounting for approximately 96%, while offshore wind bidding totaled 1.15 GW.
        <br>
        Leading turbine manufacturers such as Envision Energy, Goldwind, and Mingyang Smart Energy captured around 75% of the total bids.
        <br>
        Following last year's call for a "de-involution" in the wind power industry, turbine prices have begun to recover. Data from Fengmang Energy indicates that in Q1 2025, the price of onshore wind turbines (including towers) stabilized, with the lowest price at 1,443 yuan/kW and the average price ranging between 2,000 and 2,200 yuan/kW.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> According to a report by CICC Securities, wind power bidding volume is expected to increase by 90% year-on-year in 2024, with 2025 anticipated to be a period of intensive deliveries, leading to continued profit improvements in upstream manufacturing. Zheshang Securities also predicts rapid growth in wind power installations in 2025, with onshore installations likely to exceed 100 GW and offshore installations expected to reach 15 GW.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>Tsinghua University Plans to Establish Four New Colleges by 2025, Including Energy and AI+</b>
        Recently, Tsinghua University's Teaching Committee held its first plenary meeting in 2025, announcing plans to establish four new colleges focused on AI+, international STEAM, energy, and future engineering.
        <br>
        The college specializing in energy will leverage the university's multidisciplinary strengths in the energy sector and aims to cultivate innovative leaders equipped with a strong national sentiment and broad international perspective, as well as a solid engineering foundation and strategic foresight. The college will provide immersive experiences throughout the entire innovation chain, from fundamental research to practical application, supporting China's energy strategy transformation and competitiveness enhancement.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> The establishment of these new colleges aims to integrate disciplinary strengths and promote interdisciplinary innovation, further enhancing Tsinghua University's talent cultivation model. For example, the AI+ college will focus on utilizing the university's significant strengths in artificial intelligence to nurture the most innovative AI talent, promoting deep integration between AI and various disciplines.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>China's New Energy Vehicle Production Increased by 40.6% in March</b>
        On April 16, the National Bureau of Statistics released economic data for the first quarter of the year. In March, the industrial value added of large-scale industries increased by 7.7% year-on-year in real terms, with a month-on-month growth of 0.44%. For the January to March period, the year-on-year increase was 6.5%.
        <br>
        In March, among the 623 products produced by large-scale industries, 405 saw year-on-year increases in output. Specifically, automobile production reached 3.045 million units, growing by 8.4%, with new energy vehicles accounting for 1.298 million units, a 40.6% increase. Power generation was 778 billion kWh, up 1.8%, and crude oil processing reached 63.06 million tons, a 0.4% rise.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> This data indicates a stable start to the national economy in the first quarter, with a positive outlook for high-quality development, particularly in the robust growth of the new energy vehicle market.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>China Achieves Significant Breakthrough in Hydrogen Energy Measurement</b>
        On April 15, the first domestic verification device for a direct pipe structure 70 MPa compressed hydrogen refueling machine was officially accepted. This technology was developed entirely in China, filling a domestic gap. Its successful development marks a breakthrough in the field of hydrogen energy measurement, providing crucial technical support for the high-quality development of the hydrogen energy industry.
        <br>
        The project lead, Yu Bin, explained that the device's internal piping adopts a direct pipe structure, compatible with both 35 MPa and 70 MPa working pressures, making it suitable for high-pressure gases. Additionally, the design meets the highest explosion-proof safety standards for electrical equipment, addressing safety concerns for low-voltage devices used on-site.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> The high-quality development of the hydrogen energy industry relies on precise measurement technology. The successful R&D of this device provides essential support for measurement and quality safety testing in the hydrogen energy sector. In the future, China is expected to further integrate measurement, safety, and certification technologies, creating a comprehensive support system for hydrogen energy industry measurement and quality assurance.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>20 Energy Storage Companies Discuss Self-Regulatory Charter Behind Closed Doors</b>
        On April 15, following self-regulatory actions in the photovoltaic and wind power sectors, the photovoltaic inverter and energy storage industries are likely to follow suit. Sources revealed that the China Photovoltaic Industry Association recently convened a closed-door seminar to prevent "involutionary" competition among photovoltaic inverters and energy storage sectors, during which a healthy development initiative was preliminarily reviewed.
        <br>
        The meeting, held behind closed doors, included executives from over 20 leading companies, such as Envision Energy, Sungrow, Huawei, CRRC, CATL, and others.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> In March, energy storage system prices fell to the "0.3 yuan era," and the minimum price for photovoltaic inverters also dropped to 0.082 yuan/W. This vicious competition not only reduces industry profits but may also impede technological innovation and product quality improvement. The implementation of self-regulatory initiatives will enhance the operational capabilities of the industry and promote the development of China's renewable energy sector.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>Prices of Certain Rare Earths Continue to Rise</b>
        Under the influence of export control policies, prices for some medium and heavy rare earths have seen significant increases, particularly for terbium oxide, which is experiencing rapid growth and an upward trend.
        <br>
        According to Baichuan Yingfu, the price of domestic terbium oxide reached 7.25 million to 7.30 million yuan per ton on April 14, a 9.6% increase compared to April 3 (the last trading day before the export controls). The price of domestic metallic terbium rose by 10.2% to 8.95 million to 9.05 million yuan per ton.
        <br>
        In terms of overseas prices, on April 14, the FOB price of terbium oxide was in the range of 994 to 998 USD per kilogram, marking a 9.3% increase since April 3, while the offshore price of metallic terbium was 1,227 to 1,231 USD per kilogram, up 9.5%.
        <br>
        However, following the export controls, the prices of dysprosium oxide and metallic dysprosium have declined. Analysts at Shanghai Nonferrous Metals Network noted that while dysprosium is also affected by export controls, magnetic material companies can partially replace dysprosium with holmium, resulting in a notable increase in holmium product demand.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> On one hand, domestic mining quotas are tightening, as the implementation of the "Rare Earth Management Regulations" is promoting industry order, compressing illegal mining and inefficient production capacity, thus raising production costs. On the other hand, imports are becoming tighter; for example, the import of Myanmar's rare earths has stalled due to policy restrictions, and while there are increases in Laotian mines, it only fills part of the gap, exacerbating raw material shortages. With the development of emerging fields such as new energy and humanoid robots, demand for rare earths is expected to remain strong.
    </li>
    <li>
        <b>Exports of Wind Turbines Increased by 43.2% in Q1</b>
        On April 14, the State Council Information Office held a routine press conference on economic data, discussing the import and export situation for the first quarter of 2025. 
        <br>
        In Q1, China's total goods trade reached 10.3 trillion yuan, a 1.3% year-on-year increase. Exports totaled 6.13 trillion yuan, growing by 6.9%, while imports were 4.17 trillion yuan, a decline of 6%.
        <br>
        In terms of domestic industrial innovation, China is seeing strong momentum in the high-end, intelligent, and green transformation of manufacturing. For instance, the export of ships and marine engineering equipment has maintained growth for four consecutive years, continuing to rise by 10.8% in Q1. Specialized equipment exports have increased for nine consecutive years, growing by 16.2% in Q1. China's new energy products continue to play a vital role in the global green transition, with exports of wind turbines, lithium batteries, and electric vehicles increasing by 43.2%, 18.8%, and 8.2%, respectively.
        <br>
        <b>Zero Carbon Interpretation:</b> As global demand for clean energy continues to rise, the export of China's wind turbines is expected to maintain a growth trend. Additionally, the balanced layout of China's wind power industry chain and the global market expansion of leading companies will further enhance China's competitiveness in the global wind power market.
    </li>
</ol>

<h2>2. Special Carbon Discussion</h2>
<h3>The Future AI Discourse May Be Written in Power Grid Dispatch Tables</h3>
The end of computing power is energy. As countries move away from coal and embrace new energy sources, former President Trump has once again taken a step backward due to AI.
On April 8, Trump signed several executive orders aimed at expanding coal mining and coal-fired power generation, intending to revive the long-declining coal industry in the U.S.
According to the Associated Press, under these four executive orders, Trump could use emergency powers to allow some aging coal plants originally planned for shutdown to continue operating to meet the increasing electricity demand driven by data centers, AI, and electric vehicles.
“We need to develop artificial intelligence and all these upcoming new technologies,” Trump stated, “We need twice the amount of electricity we have now.”
On April 28, 2024, Goldman Sachs released a deep report titled "Generational Growth AI, Data Centers and the Coming US Power Demand Surge," predicting that from 2023 to 2030, electricity demand from U.S. data centers will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 15%, with the share of data center electricity consumption rising from the current 3% to 8% by 2030.
Not only in the U.S., but the demand for electricity driven by AI is rapidly increasing globally, especially in the data center sector. The International Energy Agency (IEA) released a special report on April 12 titled "Energy and Artificial Intelligence," forecasting that at the current pace, global electricity demand from data centers will more than double by 2030, reaching approximately 945 terawatt-hours annually, slightly higher than Japan's total electricity consumption each year.
The IEA indicates that the surge in electricity consumption from data centers will inevitably lead to increased carbon emissions, with annual CO2 emissions expected to rise from the current 180 million tons to 300 million tons by 2035. Global CO2 emissions are projected to reach 4.16 billion tons in 2024.
A global power competition driven by AI is reshaping energy markets, geopolitical dynamics, and even climate policies.

<h3>The Essence of AI: From "Algorithm Race" to "Energy Struggle"</h3>
The evolution of AI has shifted from an "algorithm race" to an "energy struggle." Over the next decade, the imbalance in supply and demand for computing power and energy may trigger more intense conflicts—whether between tech companies or nations controlling resources. The only certainty is that whoever can secure cheap and stable electricity will dominate the next round of AI discourse.
At the beginning of the year, the U.S. government announced an investment of at least $20 billion to build data centers domestically; the European Union also launched the "Invest AI Plan," providing a special fund of 20 billion euros for support; Japan is actively collaborating with multinational tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI to expand its data center construction scale.
Meanwhile, China is also ramping up efforts. Currently, China ranks second globally in total data center scale, and it is promoting the deployment of data centers in regions rich in clean energy to optimize the layout of electricity resources. The "Eastern Data and Western Computing" project is being fully rolled out, leveraging the abundant renewable energy in the west to construct a national integrated computing network; core regions such as the Yangtze River Delta and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area are accelerating the development of intelligent computing centers, forming a collaborative ecosystem of "AI + industry." Companies like CATL and BYD are breaking through energy storage technology bottlenecks to provide green power solutions for high-energy-consuming data centers.
Clearly, the essence of this global competition is not only the iteration of algorithm models but also a contest of energy infrastructure—wind power, photovoltaics, nuclear power, and energy storage; each component may become a key to victory. When the silicon-based intelligence "brain" relies on the carbon-based world "blood," the future AI dominance may be written in the dispatch table of the power grid.

<h3>China's AI Development Path: Feeding Back the Computing Revolution through the Energy Revolution</h3>
Moreover, while global tech giants are trapped in high-energy consumption dilemmas in the computing arms race, China is exploring a unique path for AI development—feeding back the computing revolution through an energy revolution.
The popular DeepSeek, which emerged at the beginning of the year, employs technology like mixture of experts (MoE) to dynamically activate partial parameters during inference, significantly reducing computational load compared to traditional dense models (like GPT-3). For instance, the DeepSeek-MoE model requires activating only a small fraction of its parameters to complete equivalent tasks; DeepSeek-V3 has 671 billion parameters but activates only 37 billion parameters during each inference. This sparse activation mechanism greatly enhances computational efficiency, significantly reducing the computational load compared to traditional dense models (like GPT-3), and this "neural switch" design markedly lowers energy consumption during individual inferences.
OpenAI founder Sam Altman has asserted, "The ultimate bottleneck for AI is energy." China's practice suggests that the real breakthrough may be "electricity equals computing power"—when Ningxia's wind power can be dispatched to Shenzhen's AI servers on demand like data packets, the global computing landscape will undergo fundamental changes.
This quiet revolution in the energy internet is transforming China from a "global factory" to the "global smart grid center." Over the next decade, whoever masters the synergy of green electricity and AI will define the rules of the next digital civilization.

<h3>Who Will Gain the Advantage in the New Round of Industrial Transformation?</h3>
The green industrial revolution instigated by AI is reshaping the underlying logic of global climate governance and will determine the new growth poles of the global economy for the next decade.
China is leveraging its full industry chain advantages in "wind, solar, and storage" and the national project "Eastern Data and Western Computing" to build a unique global green electricity-computing collaborative network; the U.S. continues to drive breakthroughs in AI and hard technologies like nuclear fusion, relying on deep ties between tech giants and energy startups; the EU is attempting to seize rule-making power through tools such as carbon border taxes, though limited by energy dependency; resource-rich countries like Saudi Arabia and Chile are positioning themselves to leap into the new energy era through sovereign fund investments.
At the enterprise level, integrators like Huawei are forming closed-loop ecosystems through vertical layouts; disruptors in fields like nuclear fusion and quantum computing may bring about groundbreaking innovations; vertical champions like CATL are constructing invisible barriers in niche sectors. The next 2-3 years will see three key battlegrounds: real-time programmability of power systems, widespread application of carbon intelligence, and breakthroughs in computing power efficiency by orders of magnitude. If enterprises can harness the multiplier effect of "AI × green technology," they will gain a competitive edge in the new wave of industrial transformation.