China said that it will begin putting caps on annual coal consumption to 4.2 billion by 2020, the government's State Council said in a statement.

The Council also said that China plans to limit coal-bed methane output of 30 billion cubic meters by 2020.

China consumed 3.61 billion tons of coal in 2013, and total energy use, which includes natural gas, nuclear power, hydropower and solar power, was 3.75 tons of standard coal last year, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics.

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Coal represents as much as two-thirds of China's energy consumption last year, according to the bureau.

As part of the government's plan to cap China's increasing energy consumption rate,

China is hoping to generate 15 percent of its energy from non-fossil fuels, more than 10 percent from natural gas, and reduce its coal dependence to under 62 percent between now and 2020.

Chinese President Xi Jinping last week said that the country will raise the amount of energy used from zero-emission sources to 20 percent by 2030. China also plans to have 58 gigawatts of nuclear power installed by 2020, which is almost quadruple its current capacity, as well as an extra 30GW or more under construction by then.

TagsChina to Cap Coal Energy Use by 2020, coal consumption, coal industry, Environment, energy caps