China's October Power Output Falls 4%, First Drop Since 2005

By Wang Ying and Winnie Zhu

Nov. 13 (Bloomberg) -- China's power production fell 4 percent in October, the first decline since March 2005, as a slowdown in the world's fourth-biggest economy cut demand.

Electricity output declined to 264.5 billion kilowatt hours, the National Bureau of Statistics said in a statement on its Web site today.

China's economy expanded at the slowest pace since 2003 in the third quarter. Half of China's toymakers shut in the first seven months, according to the official Xinhua news agency, while the nation's manufacturing in October contracted by a record as exports declined.

``Power demand in 13 provinces fell last month,'' the China Electricity Council said in a presentation handed out at a conference in Beijing. China has 27 provinces and municipalities with provincial status.

Electricity consumption dropped 1.4 percent to 270.9 billion kilowatt-hours in October, according to preliminary data from the council. Power use in Shanxi, China's biggest coal-producing province, fell 12 percent, it said.

Power plant utilization in the first 10 months of this year declined 200 hours to 3,981 hours, the council said.

China's power consumption growth may slow to between 4 and 8 percent in 2009 as the economy cools, Shan Baoguo, head of research at China State Grid Corp.'s Beijing unit, said Nov. 4. The country's electricity production has maintained double- digit growth for at least the last four years.

Coal output rose 9 percent to 220 million metric tons in October and crude production climbed 3.9 percent to 16.35 million tons, the statistics bureau said.

-- Editor: Ang Bee Lin, John Viljoen.

To contact the reporter on this story: Wang Ying in Beijing at wang30@bloomberg.net. Winnie Zhu in Shanghai at wzhu4@bloomberg.net.