China's NDRC warns of summer power shortages

BEIJING, June 1 (Reuters) China's power output in the first half of 2007 will rise 14 per cent from a year earlier to 1.45 trillion kilowatt hours (KWh), but the country's industrial hubs and inland Sichuan province face shortages, the government said.

Demand will likely outpace supply in southern provinces of Guangdong and Zhejiang, coal-rich Shanxi, heavy industry-laden Liaoning, inland Sichuan and island Hainan provinces, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a statement posted on its Web site (www.ndrc.gov.cn).

Unreliable rainfall could also threaten supplies in areas heavily dependent on hydropower, the report added. Low water levels in reservoirs in central Hubei province have already forced some restrictions on power use.

Across the rest of the country fast capacity expansion in both generation and transmission should mean secure supplies even in hot summer months, the report said.

But China's main grid operator has also warned of power shortages in the summer in cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing.

The latest data showed power generation nationwide rose 15.6 per cent from a year earlier to 950.7 billion KWh in the first four months of this year.

Power usage reached 976.7 billion KWh during the same period, up 15.5 per cent from a year earlier, according to figures from the China Electricity Council.

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