China power use up 5.2% in May

Chinese power consumption growth recovered to 5.2 percent in May from 3.74 percent in April.

Nonetheless, summer shortages are unlikely with industrial electricity use still sluggish.

Total consumption reached 406.1 billion kilowatt-hours during the month, with industrial utilisation at 362.3 billion kWh, up 4.6 percent compared to May last year, the National Energy Administration said.

Over the first five months, industrial usage reached 1.7 trillion kWh, up 4.6 percent on the year, a marked improvement on the 2.1 percent growth seen from January to April.

Lu Junling, an inspector with the National Development and Reform Commission, said that the pressure on China's overburdened power grids will ease this summer, with shortages likely to hit 16-18 gigawatts, much lower than the 30-40 GW deficit in 2011.

Extremely high temperatures and low water levels at China's hydropower plants could see the situation deteriorate, but the overall supply gap has "clearly narrowed" compared to previous years and will be less than 3 percent of the total load.

Lu of the NDRC said coal supply strains have eased considerably this year, with prices around 10 percent lower than last year and power plant inventories at a record 93.13 million tonnes by June 10, up 48.3 percent compared to the same period of 2011 and the equivalent of around 28 days of utilisation.

The NEA said 18.3 gigawatts of new power capacity was put into operation in the first five months.

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