China power needs are enormous and coal cannot produce all the new power needed. China needs one gigawatt per week of new power. State of California needs one gigawatt new electricity per year, and India needs one gigawatt new electricity every other week.

Soaring Global Energy Demand
The International Energy Agency projects that the global energy demand will increase by 50 percent between now and 2030. The energy demand of California, the world’s fifth largest ‘country’ with a population of 55 million, for example grows by one gigawatt per year. China adds one gigawatt per week and India adds one gigawatt every other week. “Oil supplies cannot cover this soaring energy demand. There will soon be a gap between demand and supply,” Mays said. About 70 percent of the new power production in China and India will therefore be coal based, said Paul Ezekiel, head of Global Carbon Trading at Credit Suisse. But to tackle the impact of climate change, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions caused by fossil fuels such as oil and coal need to be cut significantly. He underscored that a third of the necessary emission cuts need to take place in the power and transport sectors, while another quarter of the cuts need to result from forestry. And it is important to act now. The impact of climate change could cost 5 to 20 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) if no action is taken, while the cost of action would only cost about 1 percent of GDP, the experts said citing the Stern report on climate change.