In this study, the effect of energy demand on GDP in China is questioned between 1980 and 2015. The empirical results show that energy demand contributes substantially to GDP growth in the long run. Another appealing aspect of the research is the significance of using renewable-energy sources for economic growth in China. In this study, cointegration and autoregressive distributed lag modelling (ARDL) are both used. It is also shown that CO₂ emissions from coal energy significantly contribute to greenhouse emissions, while emissions from combustible renewable energy reduces CO₂ intensity. The outcome suggests that renewable energy demand and consumption have the capacity to lower the impact of the greenhouse effect on the economic growth aspirations of China, which could guarantee the country’s achievement of reaching the CO₂ emissions reduction target by 2020.