LANZHOU - Dunhuang, an ancient desert city famous for the Buddhist art in the Mogao Grottoes, will also soon be known for its thousands of photovoltaic panels soaking up the blistering sunshine.
As part of China's western development strategy, Dunhuang, in the northwestern Gansu province, is booming as a "green energy" city with a solar power industry in the desert.
Dunhuang has more and brighter sunlight than anywhere else in China.
By 2012, the installed solar photovoltaic generating capacity will reach 300,000 kilowatts (kW) and solar heat generation 50,000 kW, says Sun Yulong, secretary Of the Dunhuang City Committee of the Communist Party of China.
"Photovoltaic generation in Dunhuang will eventually reach 10 million kW," he says of the city's plans.
China's government began the strategy of "developing the west" in 2000 to help the less-developed areas of western China -- six provinces, five autonomous regions and Chongqing Municipality -- catch up with relatively well-off eastern China.
According to the second phrase of the strategy, Dunhuang is a major part of "China's New Energy Map."
New energy projects top the 23 key projects in 2010 listed in the strategy.
"It is of great importance for China and the world that China's west find its way with a new development mode. It should be clean, scientific and efficient development," says Yang Mu, senior researcher with the East Asian Institute of Singapore's National University.
"The western part of China has an acute shortage of water. It is uninhabitable for large populations, and unsuitable for a labor-intensive industrial economy," Yang says.
As a relatively backward region, its development has been a matter of concern.
Its development should not simply copy the east's industrialization. It should avoid the mode that "emphasizes development while neglecting the environment," says Zhuang Jian, senior economist with the Asian Development Bank's China Mission.
Wind power is another focus of China's western development strategy.
China's first 10-million-kW wind power station is being developed in Jiuquan, a city neighboring Dunhuang in Gansu province, where more than 1,450 wind turbines are turning in the Gobi Desert.
Jiuquan and nearby regions form a horn-shaped landform, which is perfect for wind power. Moreover, it has continuous year-round wind.
"The first phase of the station will be finished by the end of September. This desolate area is becoming the power engine for the country with sunshine and wind," says Li Jianhua, secretary of the Jiuquan City Committee of the Communist Party of China.
The western regions of Gansu province, and Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang Uygur autonomous regions are rich in both traditional and new energies. Forests of wind turbines and sun-powered street lamps are their new landmarks.
However, such projects are being replicated with no overall strategy for their development. Experts have called for a comprehensive plan for the locations and production capacity.
The electricity grid still lags behind the creation of wind farms.
"The race to install turbines and solar photovoltaic panels has led to waste," says Wang Zhigang, general manager with the solar power project of the State-owned China Guangdong Nuclear Group, in Dunhuang.
"But definitely, new energies are the right way to develop the west. The government should pay more attention to overall planning and positioning," Wang says.
