China will boost its installed hydropower capacity by 90 per cent to 380m kW by 2020 in an effort to meet the country’s pledge at last year's Copenhagen climate conference to generate 15 per cent of its power from non-fossil sources by 2020, said a top energy official.

National Energy Administration Director Zhang Guobao said the expansion was necessary for China to meet its target of reducing carbon intensity by 40-45 per cent by the end of the decade based on 2005 levels.

Zhang said that the new projects would be developed under stricter approval procedures than were applied before, paying more attention to environmental protection, the rights of relocated communities and land resources.

Hydropower will have to account for 60 per cent of China’s non-fossil energy by 2020 if the country is to meet its target, he added. To meet the target, around Rmb1,000bn would be invested in building dams over the next five years.