TEHRAN – Iranian Energy Minister Abbas Ali-Abadi has said the country is in talks with China to expand cooperation in the renewables sector.

Speaking to the press on the sidelines of the 24th Iran International Electricity Exhibition (IEE 2024), Ali-Abadi mentioned his recent visit to China, saying: “During my trip to China, negotiations were held with some Chinese companies to develop cooperation in the field of renewables.”

According to the minister, during the meetings, the Iranian side briefed the Chinese about Iran’s potential in the renewable sector and invited the representatives of the mentioned companies to visit the Islamic Republic to explore cooperation opportunities.

China has dominated recent progress in the global green transition, said an opinion article published by The New York Times in mid-September.

"When you look at the world outside of China, those eye-popping global curves flatten out considerably -- green energy is still moving in the right direction, but much more slowly," said the article published at the time.

In the area of solar power, in 2023, the world including China installed 425 gigawatts of new solar power; the world without China installed only 162 gigawatts, said the article. "China accounted for 263 gigawatts; the United States accounted for just 33."

From 2019 to 2023, China grew its amount of new added capacity more than eight times over, and the world without China didn't even double its rate, said the article.

The pattern extends beyond solar. According to one recent estimate, nearly two-thirds of all big solar and wind plants being built globally this year are in China, which is deploying green energy at more than eight times the scale of any other country in the world.

China is also helping power green transitions of other countries, said the article. "In 2022, roughly 90 percent of the solar wafers and solar cells produced in the world were Chinese -- by some measures more than twice as many as the rest of the world was even ready to install."

China is wagering an enormous amount of its future on nascent energy technologies -- and racing well ahead of the global promises it has made about the speed of its own transition.

EF/MA