According to the notice issued on May 13 by China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country's State Electricity Regulatory Commission and Bureau of Power will as of June 1 abolish the existing preferential policy on power prices for energy intensive sectors, including the steel, ferroalloy and calcium carbide sectors.
According to the notice, a differential pricing system will still be in force for the eight sectors, i.e., the steel, ferroalloy, calcium carbide, electrolytic aluminum, caustic soda, cement, yellow phosphorus and zinc sectors. As of June 1, power prices for these sectors will be raised from the current RMB 0.05/kWh to RMB 0.1/kWh. Meanwhile, for enterprises with extremely high levels of energy consumption, power prices will rise from RMB 0.2/kWh to RMB 0.3/kWh.
Since the advent of the global financial crisis in 2008, some provincial governments in China have implemented preferential power pricing policies to different degrees.