Electricity price adjustment to release positive signals Datang: Thermal power spring has arrived

Electricity price adjustments release positive signals

Although Datang Group ranked first among the five major power generation groups, Liu Shunda, the chairman of the group and the party leader, still said optimistically that the spring of thermal power had already come and the huge loss was about to turn around.

Main capital inflows into individual stocks (01/09) Certain stocks fled to flee and certainly regretted that the sudden rise was likely to happen unexpectedly to the investors' gospel: the stocks were saved!

In the first nine months of 2011, the thermal power business of the five major power generating groups suffered a loss of 26.6 billion yuan, and the number of insolvent enterprises in the entire industry exceeded 20%, while Datang Group was considered to be the most serious loss-making state-owned power generation company in 2011.

Liu Shunda said in an interview with the reporters from the “First Financial Daily” on the 7th “High-Level Forum on Chinese Enterprise Development” on January 7 that Datang Group had the largest proportion of thermal power business. As a result of hydropower production cuts due to drought last year, Datang’s loss was reported. It may be the most in power companies, but the state of thermal power industry-wide loss for four consecutive years will not continue. The spring of thermal power has come.

"The spring of fire has arrived"

Liu Shunda’s most complete reason for making this judgment is that the proportion of electric energy in the terminal energy is increasing in all countries of the world. Electric energy is the cleanest and the highest energy efficiency. Coal is still the main resource in China. In addition, thermal power also has other power supplies. Unmatched peak-regulating effect, so in the next two or three decades, thermal power is still the main force of China's electricity supply.

“I believe that the spring of thermal power has arrived. Spring is a person born in the spring or past winter.” Liu Shunda said that from the policy of adjusting the price of electricity twice last year, “the state has already realized this problem and left It's not too far away."

Liu Shunda also stated that the five major power generation groups have made historic progress in their equipment and economic and technical indicators. They are at the leading level in the world, but have suffered losses in the entire industry for four consecutive years. This problem is not easy to solve, but it cannot be simply attributed to coal. Electricity contradictions, transportation bottlenecks and intermediate links have caused a large impact on thermal power losses. After undergoing the latest price adjustment, the current average loss per unit of electricity is 8 cents.

Dongxing Securities also released a research report a few days ago that the thermal power industry's profitability has been at the bottom of the region. With reference to the historical development of China's power industry, the demand for supply has been forced and the crisis has forced reforms. If coal and electricity linkages do not perform well in 2012, thermal power losses With the intensification of the electricity shortage, the reform of the power system is expected to restart, and the dilemma of “market coal and planned electricity” is expected to be accelerated.

With regard to the idea that "the arrival of thermal power in spring," the industry also has different voices. Zhang Yanlin, research director of China Investment Consulting Co., Ltd., said that the days of thermal power companies will not be better in 2012, and the high coal prices will hardly change in the short term. Thermal power companies will still be subject to high cost of coal purchases and they will be more difficult to manage. De-NOx and other energy-saving emission reduction work will lead to a substantial increase in cost of thermal power companies. At present, there is no major change in the power system. Thermal power companies have to survive the next year.

A 500 billion yuan gap?

As for how to solve the problem of thermal power losses, Liu Shunda believes that it is not that the price of coal rises as soon as it rises, and it is caught in the “coal-electricity linkage” cycle.

In his view, this is a problem of the entire country's energy system construction, not only the coal and electricity issues, but also the optimization of route choices. He believes that a modern energy system should be established. This energy system is not guided by GDP. It must be designed in accordance with people-centered principles. It must be based on economic and social development to meet the demand for electricity, and must develop the necessary cash for coal, electricity, oil, transportation, and economic development. Combined with the flow, it can solve the thermal power losses.

However, before the modern energy system was established, major power generation groups must survive through their own efforts and their own channels.

Relevant statistics show that in the cost of thermal power generation, coal accounts for about 70% of the total cost, and the coal price is 7 times that of 9 years ago. In 2002, the actual average price of coal in China was about RMB 150 per ton, and so far, the standard coal price of 7,000 kcal has exceeded RMB 1,000 per ton.

Liu Shunda felt deeply about this. "From 2004 to 2011, the cost of coal increased by the five major power generation groups was as high as 500 billion yuan." He said, "The cost of this 500 billion yuan is that we bought a single bill for the whole society if we make up for this 500 billion yuan. In the shortfall, our economic indicators are all right now. There is no channel to digest the cost of rising coal prices, which is the main reason for the loss of thermal power.”

In fact, in order to solve the thermal power losses, major power companies, including Datang, have been actively developing coal-electricity integration in recent years. “We used to highlight our main business, we did not own coal mines, and we did not have other operations, but now we are forced to do so.” Liu Shunda said, but from the perspective of the industry chain, there should be an overall layout and do a good job of overall demand planning. Instead of just solving the problem from coal and electricity integration.

However, there is also a different understanding of the power companies for the upstream expansion. Lin Boqiang, director of the China Energy Economic Research Center at Xiamen University, believes that the investment of electric power companies in coal mines and other areas is deviated from the right path, and there is a division of labor that is contrary to the market's specialization and further aggravates distortions in market coal and planned electricity.