Karachi: Renewables First, a reflection group on energy and the environment, launched a new report entitled “leader of one or leader of none – China’s Choice for Clean Over Coal in Pakistan”, which examines the growing paradox of China in the world South: acting both as a pivotal case study.
The withdrawal of America from the Paris Agreement has launched an international climate action in uncertainty, raising questions about who, if someone, could assume world leadership in the fight against climate change. Since then, several de facto contenders have emerged – but not formal leaders, they are influential actors who shape the global energy transition. Paradoxically, the largest carbon issuer in the world – China – has become a dominant force in clean energy manufacturing. It now provides a large part of the world of renewable energy technologies which are essential to combat climate change.
These very technologies recently sparked a major energy change in Pakistan, called in the report as the “solar rush”. Unlike transitions by government proclamations or conference room strategies, this change occurs on roofs, farms and factory hangars across the country. In just five years, more than 39 GW of solar panels – almost all from China – have entered Pakistan, a volume exceeding three -quarters of the country’s installed production capacity. However, this remarkable transformation went largely unnoticed on a global scale, and its implications for climate leadership remain underestimated.
The report explores this transformation in depth, emphasizing the double role of China in the world South, both as a key fossil fuel investor and a leading supplier of solar and wind technologies. It unpacking the dynamics of the solar rush, revealing how one of the fastest growth solar markets in the world has emerged – not by major strategies – but by open trade, competitive prices and an afflux of affordable technologies.
Between 2020 and early 2025, China exported more solar panels to Pakistan than to many G20 countries – more than 16 GW in 2024 – with the momentum continuing to build. However, as solar adoption increased, the coal -fired power plants supported by Chinese in Pakistan began to look like blocked assets. Once considered essential to energy security, these coal -fired power plants are now faced with considerable use of reduction considerably – as low as 4.0% in some cases by 2024. In the meantime, capacity payments have skyrocketed and the electricity of the network has become more expensive for remaining consumers.
“China’s solar panels are exceeding China’s electric power plants,” said Muhammad Basit Ghauri, the main report. “What we see is an involuntary but deep strategic contradiction. And Pakistan is zero terrain for this global experience of energy disruption. ”
At the heart of the report is an urgent question: will China adopt its role as world leader in clean energy, or will it be by default a status quo which leaves its investments in danger and its world leadership not made?
The report stresses that if the possibility of leadership remains, it decreases quickly. Decentralized solar now moved centralized electricity production, the needs of Pakistan have evolved. It now requires not only panels, but also storage solutions, grid improvements, local manufacturing, financial instruments and a roadmap to move away from blocked coal assets.
Pakistan is perhaps the first country to attend a large-scale confrontation between inherited coal and decentralized solar, but it will not be the last. If China faces this challenge successfully, it could not only direct the energy transition of Pakistan, but also cement its role as an architect with a new energy paradigm for the world South – which is fast, fair and really transformer.
