China and Climate: Unusual Typhoon Activity in 2026

Typhoon Saudel, which made three landfalls in China—including its final on September 3 in Fujian Province—marked the seventh typhoon to hit the country this year. It was the third typhoon to hit Yuhuan, China, in two months, an extremely rare occurrence. The storm’s rainfall triggered a mudslide that left at least sixteen dead in Jiangxi Province. Jiangxi reported direct economic losses of ¥452 million ($67.3 million). Heavy rain hit Fujian Province and flash floods trapped students and teachers in a school in Wenzhou in Zhejiang Province. Thus far, for this typhoon season, China has largely provided relief based on established response measures such as evacuations and emergency funding. 

What could become the strongest Super El Niño on record will likely peak in November, the director of the National Climate Center in China, Chao Qingchen, announced at a press conference. This year, El Niño has shifted typhoon formation farther east in the Pacific Ocean, making tropical cyclones travel longer distances to reach China. One expert even noted that the 2026 typhoon season could extend through December rather than ending in October or November. Northern China has seen an increase in rainfall over the last two decades, driven in part by an uptick in typhoon activity, according to a Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences study reported in CGTN. 

In late August, the Trump administration issued another emergency order focused on securing the United States’s bulk power system. Citing a national security emergency, the order restricts foreign-made grid equipment due to its cyber risk to the U.S. grid. The order prohibits the “acquisition, importation, transfer, or installation of any foreign-produced bulk-power system electric equipment.” Countries including China, Japan, and South Korea, as well as those the European Union—all large producers of bulk power equipment—will need to adapt to those increased restrictions. Although China is not specifically mentioned due to it’s dominance in the production of renewable energy materials, the bill will lead to increased restrictions on Chinese suppliers. Currently, the executive order does not clarify whether the ban only includes the software and control systems most susceptible to cyber risk or whether it also pertains to solar and battery modules produced by a foreign country.  

The order has led to significant uncertainty across industries in the United States, including U.S. battery energy storage systems and other utility scale projects. The Department of Energy has 120 days to implement the ban and clarify the specific language around the restrictions. That emergency order follows the Trump administration’s tariffs and increased price floors on imported raw polysilicon, which also aim to limit China’s market control in the solar and semiconductor manufacturing supply chains. The tariffs and price floor were also implemented on national security grounds. 

Following the summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington, DC, in late September, China agreed to import at least ten million tons of coal from the United States in 2027 and 2028, representing only 2 percent of China’s imports. Although the trade deal is modest relative to China’s overall coal imports, the deal represents a notable reopening of a trade market between the countries, as China had effectively stopped buying U.S. coal after tariffs escalated in 2025. It also comes at a unique time in which many Asian economies have begun to increase coal-fired power due to unstable global energy supplies affected by disruption around the Strait of Hormuz. China also faces uncertainty over domestic coal production and supplies from Indonesia, a leading supplier, which has been tightening control of its natural resource exports. 

Coal is now among U.S. products China will consider as part of the “30-for-30” framework [PDF], under which each country plans to import a total of $30 billion of goods from the other at lower tariff rates. That deal comes against the backdrop of the Trump administration regularly emphasizing coal as part of the “energy dominance” agenda, which seeks to revive the dying US industry and strengthen coal’s role in the energy mix. China’s Ministry of Commerce said the imports would offer “a beneficial supplement to China’s domestic market and a source of stable income and jobs for the U.S. coal industry.”