Chinese utilities acquired assets worth US$12b in 2016

These are all just from cross-border transactions.

According to EY's Power transactions and trends: 2016 review and 2017 outlook, in Q4, utilities from China and the Philippines acquired US$8.4b of generation and integrated utility assets. In China alone, utilities bought US$3.4b of generation assets, taking advantage of low valuations as the shift toward renewables continues.

In December, India’s National Thermal Power Corporation announced it would replace 11 GW of old coal power generation capacity with new, more efficient coal generation capacity by 2020 at an estimated investment of US$500b.

Here's more from EY:

Inbound renewable energy opportunities attract diverse investors. In Q4, brownfield deals totaled just US$603m compared with US$1.2b in Q3.

In comparison, greenfield renewable energy projects increased in value from US$3.5b in Q3 to US$4b in Q4. In November, Ireland’s Mainstream Renewable Power agreed to build and operate wind projects in Vietnam worth more than US$2.2b.

In December, Shell announced plans to form a new company to invest in renewable energy in the Philippines, while Apple signed PPAs to acquire 285 MW of wind energy from China’s Goldwind.

2016 saw Chinese utilities acquire assets worth US$12b in cross-border transactions, including US$4.3b in Q4. Notable deals included Shanghai Electric’s US$2.3b acquisition of a 66.4% stake in Pakistan’s K-Electric and China General Nuclear Power Group’s purchase of 14 wind energy plants from Ireland-based Gaelectric