On September 4th, in Da'an City, Baicheng, Jilin Province, the pivotal project of the national 14th Five-Year Plan key power initiative—the Jingneng Da'an 2x660MW thermal peak-shaving plant, a crucial component of the Northeast Songliao Clean Energy Base power transmission project to North China—officially commenced construction. The groundbreaking of this 6.036 billion yuan peak-shaving facility signals that the "Jilin-to-Beijing Power Transmission" corridor, stretching 1,000 kilometers across six provinces and regions, has moved from the drawing board into full-scale development. Industry insiders view this as more than just a transmission route; it is a strategic link connecting the Northeast's energy strengths with the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei market demand—a bridge between the wind and solar resources of the Songliao Plain and the capital's electricity consumption, carrying the dual mission of Northeast revitalization and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei coordinated development.
The Songliao Plain's Absorption Challenge
The Northeast has never lacked wind and solar resources, particularly in western Jilin's Baicheng and Songyuan areas, situated on the southwest airflow channel between the Greater Khingan and Changbai mountain ranges. With average annual wind speeds of 6-7 meters per second and turbine utilization hours exceeding 3,000 annually, this region is one of the nation's nine major clean energy bases and the heart of the Songliao Clean Energy Base. The eastern mountainous and central plain areas are rich in photovoltaic resources, with annual sunshine hours reaching 2,000-3,000. Capitalizing on these endowments, Jilin proposed the ambitious "Land-Based Wind and Solar Three Gorges" initiative in 2021, covering 11 counties across three cities including Baicheng, Songyuan, and Siping, with the goal of reaching 30 GW of new energy capacity by 2025. By the end of 2025, Jilin's total new energy and renewable capacity had reached 33.8967 GW, accounting for 65.82% of total installed capacity and generating 50.19% of total electricity—exceeding capacity targets, yet annual generation fell short of expectations. Heading into 2026, momentum persists: as of end-February, Jilin's installed capacity reached approximately 51.99 GW, up 10% year-on-year, with wind as the province's largest power source at about 37%, and combined wind-solar share around 51%. The core issue is not generation but transmission. The National Energy Administration's 2024 Renewable Energy Development Monitoring Report shows Jilin's wind utilization rate was relatively low at just 93.6%. By 2025, absorption pressure intensified: the new energy utilization rate dropped to about 93%, down roughly 2 percentage points year-on-year, with curtailed energy reaching 3.6 billion kWh, up about 56%, and wind curtailment accounting for approximately 91% of total waste. This is not a new problem. As early as February 2017, Jilin was designated a red-alert zone for wind development by the National Energy Administration, only having the warning lifted in 2019—yet absorption pressure has never truly eased. "Wind and solar power are like local agricultural specialties—as planting scale expands, locals can't consume them all, processing capacity lags behind, and outbound logistics channels are inadequate, so a portion gets wasted." This is how industry experts describe the root of wind and solar curtailment.
A Five-Year Journey
The "Jilin-to-Beijing Power Transmission" project is precisely the remedy devised for this challenge. The project entails a 59 billion yuan investment within Jilin Province, with nearly 40 billion yuan allocated to the Da'an section, spanning five core sectors: thermal power, wind, solar, grid infrastructure, and energy storage. Leveraging the ±800 kV ultra-high-voltage DC corridor, it starts from Baicheng, Jilin, traversing Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Hebei, and Tianjin, ultimately reaching Tongzhou in Beijing. As Jilin's first UHV corridor, this route took about five years to materialize. In 2021, Jilin proposed in its 14th Five-Year Plan to initiate the "Jilin Power Southbound" UHV transmission project when appropriate. In August 2023, the National Energy Administration responded that the "Northeast Songliao Clean Energy Base to North China Power Transmission Project" was preliminarily considered for inclusion as an early-staged key trans-provincial transmission corridor; by December of that year, the "Mid-Term Rolling Adjustment Opinions for the 14th Five-Year Power Development Plan" officially incorporated the project into the national plan. In March 2026, feasibility studies and preliminary work advanced, with environmental impact assessment information for the Da'an thermal peak-shaving project first publicized that month. On September 4th of this year, the "Jilin-to-Beijing" Da'an 2x660MW thermal peak-shaving project was officially launched in Da'an City, marking the project's entry into full-scale construction. Behind this lies Jilin's urgent expectation for this energy export artery. Jin Xikui, Director of the Da'an Energy Bureau, noted that various departments collaborated intensively, compressing the timeline from indicator issuance to completion of procedures from the standard 26-month cycle to just 5 months. Chen Yue, Director of the Da'an Natural Resources Bureau, stated: "We established special task forces providing front-line services, efficiently completing land pre-approval, site selection, and construction land approvals to fully support the project's land requirements." According to reports, once fully operational, the project will deliver 26.4 billion kWh of clean green electricity annually to North China, directly creating 5,000 jobs. For the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, Beijing's green power supply will increase to 68 billion kWh, a 15 percentage point improvement over current levels, reducing standard coal consumption by over 8 million tons yearly and cutting carbon dioxide emissions by more than 20 million tons. Industry estimates suggest this transmission volume equals one-quarter of Jilin's total power generation in 2025. More importantly, it directly links the Northeast's clean energy advantages with Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei's market demand, potentially breaking the absorption bottleneck.
Dual-Side Imperatives
For Jilin and the entire Northeast, the "Jilin-to-Beijing Power Transmission" holds significance far beyond a single transmission line. In the first half of this year, Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Liaoning recorded GDP of 738.99 billion yuan, 697.88 billion yuan, and 1.62272 trillion yuan respectively, growing 3.5%, 2.4%, and 2.5% year-on-year—all below the national average, with Jilin not only ranking near the bottom nationally but also trailing within the Northeast. Particularly concerning, Jilin's industrial value-added growth turned negative at -1.2% in H1, with automobile manufacturing value-added plunging 21.0%. As the birthplace of China's automotive industry, Jilin's auto sector once accounted for over a quarter of provincial industrial output, yet in 2025 Jilin was pushed out of the national top-ten auto-producing provinces, falling to 13th place. With traditional pillar industries under transformation pressure, green energy is now viewed as a beacon of hope. Senior provincial leaders emphasized at a hydrogen energy pilot city cluster meeting that green energy must be treated as the largest growth pole for Jilin's revitalization and a key breakthrough for future industries, continuing to cultivate the hydrogen-based green energy ecosystem and building the nation's largest green liquid fuel supply base. Jilin's 15th Five-Year Plan has set targets of adding approximately 10 GW of wind-solar capacity annually over the next five years, reaching 70 GW of total wind-solar installation by 2030. The western base will establish three absorption pathways—cross-provincial transmission to Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, direct supply to provincial industry, and on-site wind-solar-to-hydrogen conversion—to address wind curtailment systematically. For Beijing at the other end, "Jilin-to-Beijing" is equally essential, with demand growth exceeding expectations. Capital Power Trading Center data shows that from January to April this year, Beijing's green power market-based direct trading reached 18.8 billion kWh, up 82.54% year-on-year, with trading volume surpassing thermal power for the first time, representing 63.63% of total market-based power transactions. Of this, 99.97% of green power came from 14 provinces and regions including Xinjiang, Tibet, Shanxi, and Jilin. Wang Li, Deputy General Manager of the Capital Power Trading Center, remarked: "This year, based on enterprise needs, we've significantly shortened green power trading cycles. Multi-year contracts can be traded monthly, inter-provincial transactions occur up to every 10 days, and Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan region deals can be processed weekly. Enterprises can purchase green power quickly, with increasingly flexible trading." The Capital Power Trading Center states that Beijing's imported green power from other provinces will reach 45 billion kWh in 2026. However, this figure still leaves a 23 billion kWh gap toward the 68 billion kWh target—and the "Jilin-to-Beijing" project's annual 26.4 billion kWh delivery precisely fills that gap. Beijing's 15th Five-Year Plan, guided by the principles of "reducing gas, minimizing oil, cleaning coal, and increasing green," proposes building a resilient, low-carbon, intelligent new energy system. Moving forward, Beijing will continue deepening cross-provincial green power cooperation and market-based trading mechanisms, transforming green electricity from the northwest and north China into the driving force for the capital's high-quality development.
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