It is the same almost every winter - China experiences some kind of energy crisis.
They occur as a result of a nationwide rise in demand at a time of likely transport slowdowns caused by snow and rain, combined with the concentration of energy resources in just a few provinces in the north and a national power supply monopoly that, up to now, has stubbornly refused to diversify away from its dependence on coal.
But this year the crisis has come earlier than the change in the weather, with a shortage of diesel spreading from the south to the north and a rise in coal prices spreading from the north to the south.
Zhang Ping, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, admitted last week that China may fail to meet its annual inflation target of 3 per cent due partly to price rises for fuel and farm products. 'Things have been worse than we had expected,' he said.
At the same time, the irony is that despite the billions of yuan being spent on the development of alternative, less polluting types of energy, the new power suppliers have yet to be connected to the national grid, prolonging the economy's coal dependence and energy imbalance.
'Diesel and coal seem two separate issues. But on a deeper level, they are connected and are two dimensions of the same problem. The economy could have become less coal- dependent had there been a more serious reform of the national grid's monopoly,' said Han Xiaoping, head of the independent energy research body China5e.com.
