China’s northeastern industrial heartland might face winter power and heating cuts after authorities in Beijing spurned requests from provincial providers for help securing coal supplies after two major mines were forced to halt output, utilities warned.
Coal-dependent power firms in the major manufacturing province of Heilongjiang issued their plea to the Chinese National Development and Reform Commission via the state power grid after authorities suspended work at mines in neighboring Inner Mongolia last month, documents posted on the Web site of coal publication sxcoal.com showed.
The documents’ authenticity was confirmed by a person familiar with the matter, who declined to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The commission and state grid were not immediately available for comment.
The mining halt is part of concerted efforts by China to tame increasingly severe winter smog in industrial centers.
However, it also shows Being’s war on pollution can roil key industries while sending coal prices sharply higher, both in China and across Asia.
In its response to the request, the commission acknowledged the coal shortage, but did not offer more supplies, the documents showed, instead calling on the provincial government to ramp up clean fuel output while cutting coal-fired generation from inland power plants.
“We believe Inner Mongolia coal mines cannot restart immediately,” the commission said in its response. “We kindly ask you [local state grid and power companies] to prepare as early as possible and make sure to send enough electricity to the grid.”
It was not immediately clear whether the northeast has enough alternative sources of energy to fill the looming supply crunch, but a utility executive said winter supplies could fall short of demand.
An electricity and heating shortage in the region — with a joint population of more than 100 million — would have severe consequences, as temperatures can plunge in winter to an average of minus-14°C to minus-30°C.
“Our power plants in [the] northern provinces of Heilongjiang, Liaoning and Jilin have the worst shortages among all of utilities,” a senior executive at China Datang Corp (中國大唐集團), which has seven power plants in the region, told reporters in a telephone interview.
“In the worst scenario, we might look to curb power production in the winter,” the executive said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. “Both private and large state-run power plants have difficulties finding supply.”
While the shortage is regional, its impact is being felt in both Chinese and global coal markets.
Zhengzhou thermal coal futures prices have jumped 12 percent since July to 635.4 yuan (US$96.98) per tonne.
Meanwhile, Australian Newcastle thermal coal cargo prices, a benchmark for Asia, have jumped by more than 20 percent since July to more than US$100 per tonne.
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