China too faces peak time power shortfall problem

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Mumbai, May 22: China may be way ahead of India in infrastructure development. However, both the countries have one thing in common, and that is power shortage. Despite an installed capacity of 440 gigawatt (GW), China has been facing peak time power shortfall.

The China State Electricity Regulatory Commission, in its paper dated May 12, has projected the maximum shortfall of power supply of 25 GW during the summer peak time. East and south China would remain the hardest hit in terms of electricity shortage.

The shortfall would be about 11 GW in east China, and 7 GW in south China. The chronic power shortage has resulted in increased strains on production safety.

For the first quarter of this year, the total electricity consumption across China was 555.564 Twh, which increased by 13.38% over the same period of last year.

The total generation nationwide was 544.928 Twh with a year-on-year of 13%. An additional generation capacity of about 65 GW would be put into operation in the current year and the total installed generation capacity nationwide would exceed 500 GW. Electricity generation would be around 2,500 Twh and the total electricity consumption would hit 2,422 Twh.

Maharashtra’s home minister RR Patil who had just returned from his week-long China visit as a state guest admitted that there has been a mismatch between demand and supply. However, Mr Patil lauded China’s fast implementation of capacity addition plans.

China SERC like SERCs in India has asked electric power enterprises to prepare contingent plans to deal with emergencies and accidents of production, make full use of the time period in the run up to the peak load time by overhauling their equipment, upgrading their technologies and removing defects so as to enhance the well being of their facilities.

China SERC like Indian SERCs has expressed concern over operation of some grids with little or even zero reserve capacity. This may pose a threat to the grid security. Some generation facilities have been operating under overloading conditions for a long term which has led to a worrying drop in the safety conditions of the equipment.

According to China SERC’s estimates, the total inter-region power exchange across the country in the current year would exceed 76 Twh with an increase of 8%.