On April 13,  the National Development and Reform Commission held a press release to brief through the development of the macro economy. Mr. Yan Pengcheng, Spokesperson and Director of Department of Policy Studies of the National Development and Reform Commission revealed that social electricity consumption in March was 513.9TWh with a year-on-year growth of 7.9%. The growth rate was 2.3 percentage points higher than that in the same period of last year.

According to Mr. Yan Pengcheng, the first quarter of 2017 saw a 6.9% year-on-year growth of social electricity consumption, 3.7 percentage points higher than that in the same period of last year. Electricity consumption of the primary industry and the secondary industry grew by 10.1% and 7.6%, 2.3 percentage points and 7.4 percentage points higher than that of the same period of last year respectively, while electricity use of the tertiary industry and residential use grew by 7.8% and 2.8%, 3.2 percentage points and 8 percentage points lower than that of the same period of last year respectively. Social electricity consumption in March was 513.9TWh with a year-on-year growth of 7.9%. The growth rate was 2.3 percentage points higher than that in the same period of last year.

In terms of the structure of electricity consumption, the secondary industry was the major contributor of the consumption rises, accounting for 75% of the total, in which electricityuse of the iron and steel industry and the nonferrous metal industry saw a year-on-year growth of 12.8% and 16%, 26.8 percentage points and 21.8 percentage points higher than that of the same period last year respectively, totally contributing to 34% of the increase in social power consumption and driving the growth of social power consumption by 2.4 percentage points. The growth of power consumption of the tertiary industry slowed down while that of cutting-edge industries such as information technology maintained rapid growth. In Q1,information transmission, computer services and software sectors recorded 13.3 percentyear-on-year growth in energy consumption, 6.4 percentage points higher than the social growth.

In terms of electricity generation, influenced by the lack of incoming water in major hydropower stations, hydropower generation showed negative growth while thermal power generation maintained steady growth. According to initial estimation, thermal power and nuclear power generation saw a year-on-year growth of 8.4% and 19.2% respectively in Q1 while hydropower generation dropped by 6.1%.

Source: people.cn