Almost half of the mainland's power plants made a loss in the first 11 months of last year as the government's power-price freeze eroded their bottom lines amid rising coal prices and higher interest rates.
The coal-fired power generation sector saw a 38.8 per cent drop in combined profit in those 11 months, the industry's planner and regulator, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), said yesterday.
It did not provide a profit figure, but according to a Samsung Securities research report, net profit was 28 billion yuan (HK$33.07 billion).
The NDRC said 43 per cent of coal-fired power plants were in the red, up from 35 per cent in 2009.
Even in the more lucrative years of 2005 to 2007, 30 to 38 per cent of the coal-fired power producers made losses, the report said.
For the whole electricity-producing industry, including non-coal power, profits edged up 3.6 per cent to 82.7 billion yuan in the 11 months.
This was largely due to last year's 19.4 per cent surge in the output of hydropower - which has no fuel cost - thanks to ample rainfall. In 2009, hydropower output grew only 1.6 per cent.