Letter from China: Energy security ambitions get a wake-up call

Widespread energy and electricity shortages over the past two months amid exceptionally cold weather serve as a bruising reality check

Beijing’s strategy for greater energy security via greater domestic production and reduced reliance on imports has rarely seemed so prescient, or so far from reality. Multiple provinces in the world’s biggest energy consumer have been grappling with crippling midwinter shortfalls of electricity, coal and natural gas, as demand during the critical period surged from an extended cold snap across much of northeast Asia. Nationwide blackouts—described as the worst in nearly a decade—were seen all the way from the economic powerhouse of Zhejiang province on the eastern seaboard, through the landlocked provinces of Hunan and Jiangxi, in central China, to the southern manufacturing hub of Guangdong