“China is building two new coal plants every week and getting away with massive pollution.”

Repeated across UN General Assembly address and subsequent venues

The "getting away with massive pollution" half of this claim collapses against the data: China's carbon dioxide emissions have been flat or falling for 21 consecutive months as of early 2026, and its coal-fired power generation actually declined in 2025, because record renewable installations covered all of the country's new electricity demand. There is a real kernel here: China is still building substantial coal capacity, about 95 gigawatts connected to the grid in 2025, with a record 161 gigawatts newly proposed, per the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and Global Energy Monitor. But those plants increasingly sit half-idle as backup: utilization has hovered around just 51 percent, and new coal permits fell to a four-year low of 45 gigawatts in 2025, signaling tightening controls. What Trump systematically omits is the other side of China's ledger: 315 gigawatts of new solar and 119 gigawatts of new wind in 2025 alone, more than four times its coal additions, pushing non-fossil sources past half (52 percent) of China's total power capacity by February 2026. And contrary to Trump's U.N. claim that China "barely uses" wind, FactCheck.org documented that China operates more wind farms than any nation on Earth, with roughly 44 percent of global capacity, nearly triple that of the United States. "China's buildout of renewable energy pushed down coal-power generation and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in 2025, meaning many coal plants are already running at just half of their maximum capacity." — Carbon Brief, reporting on the CREA / Global Energy Monitor study, Feb. 3, 2026