Electricians work on power lines in Xianju county, Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang Province. The local electric power service provider in Taizhou is renovating transmission lines running through all towns under Xianju county so as to ensure electricity supplies for everyday life and production. Photo: cnsphoto

China's electricity consumption for June rose 9.8 percent to 703 billion kilowatt-hours (kwh) from a year earlier, with total consumption in the first half year hitting 3.93 trillion kwh, up 16.2 percent year-on-year, according to data released by the National Energy Administration (NEA) on Wednesday.

Consumption of secondary industry in June hit 483.2 billion kwh, up 8.5 percent over the same period of last year and accounting for 60 percent of total power use growth, according to NEA data.

Primary industry consumed 8.8 billion kwh of electricity in June, up 16.3 percent year-on-year, while use by tertiary industry was up 17.5 percent to 122.6 billion kwh. 

Electricity consumption by residential customers totaled 88.7 billion kwh, up 6.8 percent.

The steep increase in electricity demand reflected a strong economic performance and a potentially warmer summer compared with previous years, Lin Boqiang, director of the China Center for Energy Economics Research at Xiamen University, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

"The growth also comes as a result of a low base last year, but it also indicated good momentum in China's economic rebound," Lin said

Higher than usual temperatures also increased electricity use, Lin added.

Multiple regions in China have set new records in electric load as a result of continued hot weather, affected by the subtropical high.

The electric load in East China's Jiangsu Province exceeded 120 million kilowatts (kw) on Wednesday for the first time, up 4.6 percent from the previous year.

On Tuesday, the central China branch of State Grid reached 168.18 million kw, a record high, with electric load in Central China's Hunan Province hitting 35.29 million kw and East China's Jiangxi Province reaching 28.15 million kw.

Global Times