Abstract
Accelerating offshore wind power deployment, a critical but underutilized resource for decarbonizing power systems, requires balancing national and local interests. Using China, the global leader in offshore wind, as a case study, here we evaluate how its deployment creates benefits, such as improved energy self-sufficiency, greater resource diversity, enhanced grid reliability, and increased local investment and employment. Our results show that offshore wind can bolster the energy self-sufficiency of coastal provinces, shifting them from net electricity importers to exporters. Furthermore, expanding offshore wind reduces the need for energy storage in a grid with high renewable penetration and drives substantial local investment and job creation. After quantifying uncertainties in policies, technology costs, and electricity demand, we find offshore wind could provide 3–18% of China’s electricity by 2050. Aligning local interests with offshore wind development can facilitate more ambitious targets and accelerate power system decarbonization with limited increases in system costs.
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Data availability
Key model inputs are described in the Methods section and Supplementary Tables 1–9. GridPath model inputs and source data for the figures are deposited at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19375841.
Code availability
This study uses the open-source GridPath power system model (https://github.com/blue-marble/gridpath). The script to generate the main figures is provided in a Zenodo repository: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19375841.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank the three reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. G.H. acknowledges support from the Global Energy Initiative at ClimateWorks Foundation (No. 23-2515). L.P. and J.L. acknowledge support for this work from an anonymous donor.
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L.P., J.L. and G.H. conceived the project and designed the research. G.H. provided the data required to run the GridPath model. L.P. performed the optimization experiments and analyzed the results. N.A. contributed to the grid reliability and resilience analysis. H.Y. contributed to the production cost modelling, and U.P. provided the latest renewable capacity factor data used as model inputs. L.P. wrote the manuscript. L.P., J.L. and G.H. revised the manuscript. All authors reviewed and approved the final version of the manuscript.
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Peng, L., He, G., Abhyankar, N. et al. Aligning offshore wind deployment with local priorities to accelerate power system decarbonization. Commun Earth Environ (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-026-03533-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-026-03533-9
