China Electricity Council in a report on forecast of China's power demand and supply for 2012 released on Tuesday said that China's power demand is likely to bottom out in the second half of 2012 on a possibly recovering economy in China, but the growth of power use may slower than that in the same period of last year.
According to the forecast report, China's power consumption may rise by 6% to 8% on year to 2.6 to 2.65 trillion kilowatts-hour in the second half of 2012, and amount to 4.98-5.03 trillion kilowatts-hour for the whole year of 2012, up 6% to 7% on year.
The forecast is apparently lower than an prediction at the beginning of this year because the fallback in economic growth and downward pressure in economy in the first half was far beyond expectation.
As hydropower supply keeps in good condition and coal stocks at power plants remain high, power supply and demand is expected to maintain balance during the peak summer despite slight power shortage in north, east and south China at peak period.
CEC also predicted that China may add 86 million kilowatts of power generating capacity for the whole year of 2012, including 20 million kilowatts of hydropower and 50 million kilowatts of thermal power. Total installed capacity of China may hit 1.14 billion kilowatts by the end of this year