China surpassed the U.S. to become world’s largest renewable power producer last year, BP reports.

World coal production had its biggest drop ever last year, 230 million tons of oil equivalent (mtoe), BP reported Tuesday in its 2017 Statistical Review of World Energy. China led the way with a 7.9 percent decline in coal production (140 mtoe), followed by the U.S. with a 19 percent drop (85 mtoe). For the first time, China surpassed the U.S. as the world’s biggest producer of non-hydro renewables. “The fortunes of coal appear to have taken a decisive break from the past,” BP’s chief economist Spencer Dale said Tuesday. The report explains “this shift largely reflects structural factors” — the remarkable growth of cheap natural gas and renewables — “combined with government and societal pressure to shift towards cleaner, lower carbon fuels.” Clean energy is the world’s biggest sustainable source of new high-wage jobs. No wonder China is making a $360 billion bet on renewables by 2020 — they calculate the resulting “employment will be more than 13 million people.”