Â
>>REAL-TIME UPDATES IN THE WIRE. CLICK HERE<<<
Â
Â
Southwestern China’s Sichuan province will expand the restrictions on electricity consumption by industrial enterprises in 19 cities of the province, with industrial power users on the list subject to the restrictions required to suspend production during the period of August 15 – 20, according to a notice released by the Sichuan provincial authority and the local branch of the State Grid of China on Monday.
The move is aimed at ensuring electricity supply to household users and make sure there won’t be power outage as power demand-supply situation becomes more severe, according to the notice.
According to a survey commodity consultancy Mysteel, steelmakers in Sichuan have already received the notice about production suspension and currently 80% of makers of construction steel in the province have so far completely suspended production and output declines by 45% from the previous week.
Earlier, in East China’s Anhui province, the six steelmakers with electric arc furnace production had all suspended production as of August 10 due to the authority’s requirement, and the suspension is expected to last for three days, which will reduce daily building material output by 18,000 tonne, according to the Shanghai Metals Market.
Steelmakers with blast furnace production in Anhui said they haven’t told to suspend production and they noted that, as it’s currently a peak season for power use, it may be asked to suspend production later if power supply tightens further, and some steelmakers that had planned to resume production recently have delay the plan, according to the SMM.
In the city of Nanjing, capital of East China’s Jiangsu province, the local government last Friday required government department to lower power use, industrial companies to “use power in a scientifically way” and also called for household power users to reduce power consumption.
According to the SMM, Jiangsu also imposed restrictions on power use by some steel and copper producers.