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Power consumption up for 5th consecutive month

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-11-13 19:53

BEIJING: China's National Energy Administration (NEA) announced Friday that the country's power consumption in October rose 15.87 percent year on year to 313.42 billion kilowatt-hours (kwh), up for the 5th consecutive month since June.

The growth is 5.63 percentage points higher than the September figure. Accumulative power consumption in the first ten months totaled 2977.5 billion kwh of electricity, up 2.97 percent over the same period last year.

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China's industrial sector used 232.4 billion kwh of electricity in October, up 2.2 percent from September and 17.7 percent year on year, according to NEA statistics.

In a breakdown, 193.3 billion kwh out of the 232.4 billion kwh was consumed by heavy industry, posting a 4.4 percent growth month on month and 20.11 percent growth year on year. The rest was consumed by light industry, representing a 6.88 percent growth month on month.

Of the power consumed in the first ten months of this year, 80.2 billion kwh went to primary industry, which covers agriculture, animal husbandry and fishery.

The second industry, including mining, manufactural, building and construction sectors, consumed 2191.2 billion kwh while the tertiary industry, or the service industry, consumed 325.9 billion kwh, according to NEA.

The rapid increase in October power consumption is a result of rebound in heavy industry, which began to slump in the same period last year, said Niu Li, senior researcher with the State Information Center.

"Power consumption will continue to pick up in the fourth quarter as the country's economy is witnessing a sound recovery," he said.