China faces up to power shortage (Xinhua) Updated: 2004-06-10 10:55
Beijing used to be carefree about power supply, but may face a hard time this
year.
Beijing vice-mayor Zhang Mao said Tuesday that the city, which has 59 percent
of its power supply coming from other parts of the country, might impose
brownouts this summer as power shortage worsens nationwide.
"Brownouts will be implemented in 24 provinces and municipalities this year,
compared with 16 last year. Beijing should also join the national conservation
efforts and may impose brownouts this year," he said.
An industrial report of the State Information Center forecasts China will
face more severe power shortage in 2004, compared with 2003. Areas under
continual brownouts will increase.
But it says the scenario would change for the better in the coming two years
as power shortage would ease in 2005 and disappear in 2006.
Following widespread brownouts last year, mainly fueled by rapid growth of
industrial production, the nation has acted quickly to increase power generating
capacity and promote efficient power use.
More than 200 billion yuan (US$24.1 billion) of capital went to construction
of power generating projects in 2003, almost equaling the amount of 2001 and
2002 combined.
Zhou Heliang, executive vice-president of the China Electrotechnical Society
(CES), said that China's installed power generating capacity would experience
big growth from now to 2020.
He said China had 380 million kilowatts of installed power generating
capacity by the end of 2003. The level might exceed 450 million kilowatts by
2005, 650 million kilowatts by 2010 and around 950 million kilowatts by 2020.
Meanwhile, the government has taken a number of other measures to ease power
shortage, including restricting power supply to enterprises that are big power
consumers and big polluters, evening out peak power consumption periods and
promoting efficient use of power.
A week-long nationwide campaign to educate the public about methods to save
energy, sponsored by a number of government agencies, started on June 6. Among
these methods, citizens are advised to unplug their electrical appliances if
they would lay idle for a long period, avoiding power consumption from the
standby mode.
The Municipal Government of Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu Province, has
called on government offices not to turn on air conditioners when the
temperature is below 32 degrees centigrade. It also invited the public to join
the energy saving effort.
From mid-May, Ningbo City of east China's Zhejiang Province started to modify
central air-conditioning units in 150 buildings to make them more power
efficient.
Deliberations on energy efficiency in buildings have surfaced and some cities
have taken steps in this direction.
Wang Guangtao, minister of Construction, said energy consumption of buildings
in China is double or triple that of developed countries of comparable climate.
There's much room for saving energy in this field.
Experts estimated that if new buildings and existing buildings in China all
conform to advanced energy conservation standards by 2020, their energy
consumption would drop by an equivalent of 335 million tons of standard coal per
year, compared with doing nothing at all. That's about one fifth of China's
annual energy consumption at present.
Shanghai has taken the lead in the reform. According to its plan, design and
construction of new residential buildings and public buildings must comply with
energy conservation standards by the end of 2005.