India, Oct. 18 -- In 2023, renewable energy supplied 11 per cent of the electricity consumed by China's data centres. Beijing wants that share to be four fifths by 2030. Over the same window, power demand from data centres is projected to grow by 300 to 500 billion kilowatthours, roughly 18 per cent of all electricity demand growth in China. The lower bound of that range equals the United Kingdom's entire annual consumption. China has wagered that artificial intelligence (AI) will run on wind and sunlight.

The maths is simple. China's surplus electron is a green one. In the first half of 2026, an estimated 360 terawatt-hours of wind and solar power was curtailed, up 49 per cent year on year. That wasted energy exceeded the entire 258 ter...