辜姓女孩取名:中国因华中旱情限电 影响制造企业

2011年 05月 18日 09:28中国因华中旱情限电 影响制造企业
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中国有关当局限制用电对生产商造成负面影响，当局说将在未来几个月内继续限电。河流水位较低和煤炭价格高企可能会让中国出现几年以来最严重的季节性电力短缺。

长江目前水位很低，水力发电正在放缓，航运受到影响，农作物减产。干旱情况在华中地区已持续数月之久，中国官方媒体和政府报告目前开始对旱情发出警告。

电力短缺导致工厂停工多半年年发生，而干旱警报在中国每年这个时候也屡见不鲜，不过常常会在几个月后被洪灾担忧所替代。但这次中国官方表现出来的态度凸显出今年这场来得较早的旱情造成了巨大影响，可能会成为影响全国制造业的一个更普遍的问题。制造业是推动中国经济增长的关键力量。

制造商说，地方当局实施更严厉的用电限制令他们感觉到压力。分析人士说，中国政府可能很快会鼓励电厂运营商在增加发电量同时调高电费，允许它们把不断上涨的煤价转嫁给消费者。中国上一次调高电价是2009年。

以中国东部制造业城市浙江省台州市为例，据汽车零部件制造商玉环郑氏机械有限责任公司的销售经理郑丁(音)透露，有关当局通知这里某些工厂3月每周停产一天，4月开始每周停产两天，而5月份则被迫每周停产三天。

郑丁说，为完成某些订单，该公司正使用发电机进行生产，但这不是一个用来对付长期生产的办法。

中国官方通讯社新华社报道称，作为中国政府研究部门的中国电力企业联合会可能会将2011年用电高峰期的电力供应缺口预期调高三分之一，从3,000万千瓦调高至4,000万千瓦，调高后这将是中国自2004年以来出现的最大缺口。

分析人士每年都会预计中国的电力供应缺口，目前还不清楚上调缺口预期是否会对世界第二大经济体中国更广泛的经济产出有任何实质性影响。2004年尽管也存在电力供应短缺问题，但中国经济在那一年仍增长逾10%。

有些分析人士一直把用电量看作是中国经济增长的一个指标。但由于官方不断收紧用电管制，这个指标让人愈发读不懂了。官方用电管制包括要求工厂每过几天就停工或把白天的生产挪到晚上。这些措施大概始于十年前，一般是在夏季用电高峰期，因为夏天使用空调常常会增加用电需求。如今，一些城市的制造企业全年面临用电限制，有些是因为中国政府设定的清洁空气计划目标。

中国美国商会(American Chamber of Commerce in China)近期一份报告谈到了限电措施的“意外后果”，比如它如何促使人们使用污染更甚于其他任何发电形式的柴油发电机。

中国政府计划提高替代能源产量，但花旗(Citibank Inc.)数据显示，燃煤火力发电厂约占中国4月份发电量的84%，其次是水电占11%。核电和风力发电分别只占发电量的2%左右。

据新华社报道，为缓解长江中游迫在眉睫的旱情，作为世界最大水电生产商的中国三峡大坝以每秒9,500立方米的速度放水，超过进水速度的三倍。此举明显无法长期维持。

据新华社报道，由于五个月没有下雨，被称为“千湖之省”的产棉大省湖北严重干旱，1,300多座以小型水库为主的水库无法用于灌溉。新华社报道将干旱部分归因于拉尼娜现象。它说，整个湖北地区的小麦歉收，还有消防车进村送水。

去年5月份，政府发出严重的干旱警告，但到7月份却转而担心三峡大坝因暴雨和洪水而承受2009年全部完工以来的最严峻考验。今年的干旱同样让人想起专家所说中国人口众多、环保不足造成的长期风险，特别是在北京周围的北方缺水地区。

推动中国经济增长的发电量增速并没有出现明显下降。花旗分析师刘显达(Pierre Lau)本周撰写报告说，他认为发电量增长出现了“温和放缓”，部分原因在于煤炭价格高企促使燃煤发电厂减少发电。他说，这有可能导致电费上涨。

据刘显达的数据，今年前四个月发电量增长12.6%，2010年同期增速为13.4%。刘显达说，除了包括浙江省在内的八个省份缺电以外，化工厂和钢铁厂等用电大户的需求出现了“减速”。

重庆旅行从业者Blinda Bi说，长江水位下降也已经开始影响三峡周围险峻地区的旅游。她说，上周旅行中的某些地段，我们不得不安排大巴旅游，因为水不够，没法坐大型轮船。

China Rations Power Use Amid Drought

Chinese authorities are hitting manufacturers with restrictions onelectricity usage that they say will continue in coming months, as lowriver levels and high coal prices threaten the country's worst seasonalpower shortages in several years.

China's mighty Yangtze River isrunning so low that hydropower production is slowing, shipping traffichas been curtailed and agricultural output has been reduced. Acrosscentral China, dry conditions that have persisted for months are nowbeing described in shrill terms in state media and government reports.

Powershortages lead to factory shutdowns most years and drought warnings arecommon in China this time of year, often to be replaced by floodworries a few months later. But the tone of officials underscores howthe impact is being felt earlier in the year and raises the possibilityit will become a more widespread problem for the country's manufacturingsector, a key driver of China's growth.

(This story and related background material will be available on The Wall Street Journal website, WSJ.com.)

Manufacturerssay are they feeling the pinch as local authorities mandate tougherlimits on electricity use. Analysts say Beijing may soon encouragepower-plant operators to produce more electricity with the firstelectricity tariff increase since 2009, allowing them to pass risingcoal prices onto consumers.

Some factories in Taizhou, a largemanufacturing city in eastern China's Zhejiang province, for example,were told to halt production one day a week in March, two days a weekstarting in April and this month are forced to close three out of sevendays, according to Zheng Ding, a sales manager at auto-parts makerZhejiang Zhengshi Machinery Co.

To complete certain orders, thecompany is powering its facilities using generators, said Mr. Zheng.'But this method can't be used to deal with long-term production.'

China'sstate-run Xinhua news agency reported that the China ElectricityCouncil, a research arm of the central government, could raise itsestimate for power shortages at peak times during 2011 by a third, to 40gigawatts from 30 gigawatts, which the news agency said would beChina's largest shortfall since 2004.

Analysts anticipateelectricity shortages in China each year and it is unclear yet whetherpossible adjustments upward now could have any meaningful impact onbroader output in the world's second-biggest economy. In 2004, China'seconomy expanded more than 10% despite that year's power problems.

Electricityusage has been watched by some analysts as a proxy for economic growthin China. But the picture is increasingly muddled by tightening officialcontrols on electricity use, for instance requirements by factories topower down every few days or switch work to night shifts. When measuresstarted almost 10 years ago, they typically applied during the peaksummer months when air conditioning tends to drive up demand. Thesedays, manufacturers in some cities face power limits year round, somedriven by Beijing's clean-air goals.

A recent American Chamber ofCommerce in China report cited 'unintended consequences' of therationing, including how it prompts use of diesel power generators thatare 'more polluting than many other forms of electricity generation.'

Thegovernment plans more alternative-energy production, but according toCitibank Inc., coal-fired plants produced around 84% of China's power inApril, followed by 11% from hydropower. Nuclear and wind generated onlyabout 2% each of the country's electricity.

To alleviate theimmediate concern of drought in the middle reaches of the Yangtze, theworld's largest hydropower producer, China's Three Gorges Dam, wasdischarging water at 9,500 cubic meters a second, or over three timesmore than the water flowing in, Xinhua said, a practice clearlyunsustainable for long.

Five months without rain have rendered acotton-producing region known as 'land of a thousand lakes' near thecentral Chinese city of Wuhan so dry that more than 1,300 mostly smallreservoirs can't be used for irrigation, according to Xinhua. Itsreport, blaming the drought in part on the La Nina weather pattern, saidthe region's entire wheat crop had failed and that fire trucks weredelivering water to villagers in the area.

Last year, diregovernment warnings of drought in May gave way to worries by July thattorrential rains and flooding were putting the Three Gorges Dam to itsbiggest test since becoming fully operational in 2009. Just the same,this year's drought is a reminder of what experts say are long-termrisks posed by China's big population and poor conservation,particularly in the parched north around Beijing.

There hasn'tbeen a substantial drop-off in the growth of power generation fuelingChina's growth. Citigroup analyst Pierre Lau said in a report this weekhe has seen 'moderate slowdown,' which he attributed partly tocoal-burning plants producing less electricity because of high coalprices that he said could lead to a hike in tariffs.

According toMr. Lau's numbers, power production grew 12.6% in the first four monthsof this year compared with 13.4% during the same period of 2010. Inaddition to power shortages in eight provinces, including Zhejiang nearShanghai, Mr. Lau cited 'deceleration' in demand from big users likechemical and steel makers.

Lower water levels on the YangtzeRiver are also starting to disrupt tours of the region's rocky ledgesaround the famed Three Gorges, according to Blinda Bi, a tour operatorin Chongqing. Last week, Ms. Bi said, 'For some parts of the trip, wehad to arrange bus trips because there was not enough water for largeships.'