China’s Overseas Coal Pipeline Shrinks 67%, but Private Projects Test Ban

Helsinki, 24 September 2026 – China-linked overseas coal projects have been cancelled on a substantial scale since Beijing’s 2021 pledge to stop building new coal-fired power plants abroad, but a fresh study warns that private and off-grid projects remain a material gap. Researchers found that 67% of the capacity planned when the pledge was made has since been cancelled, amounting to 61.5 gigawatts. They estimate that those cancellations avoid 6.4 billion tonnes of lifetime carbon-dioxide emissions. That emissions figure is a modelled lifetime estimate, not a measured reduction already delivered.

The five-year assessment by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and the People of Asia for Climate Solutions distinguishes cancelled projects from plants still in the development pipeline. Over the most recent 12-month period, 7.1 gigawatts was cancelled, yet 3.3 gigawatts entered construction. Another 20.5 gigawatts remained in planning without an official cancellation. For investors, the simultaneous retreat and persistence of coal point to an uneven transition rather than a clean end to Chinese-linked overseas fossil-fuel investment.