Tibet to invest $456 mln extending power grid in 2012
Shanghai. February 7. INTERFAX-CHINA - West China's Tibet Autonomous Region plans to spend RMB 2.88 billion ($456 million) to extend the regional power grid, Tibet Electricity Power Corp. (TEPC) said Feb. 7.
The funding will extend the region's grid to 26 counties by the end of the year, lifting the total number of counties connected to 58, said TEPC. Tibet's power consumption will reach 2.32 terawatt hours (TWh) in 2012, the state-owned utility added.
Home to roughly three million people, Tibet consumes less than 300 kilowatt hours of power per capita annually, some 70 percent less than the national average and the least of China's 31 provinces and regions.
The region consumed energy equivalent to 3.75 million tons of standard coal in 2010, according to the Tibet arm of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
"Currently, around 40 percent of energy consumption in Tibet is from the burning of wood, crops and animal waste, particularly in remote, rural areas," an official surnamed Liu with the Tibet NDRC told Interfax, noting that access to the power grid will reduce noxious emissions from bioenergies.
Tibet also suffers from a lack of power producing installed capacity, forcing the region to purchase electricity from other regions, notably the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region and Gansu Province, said Liu. The region plans to combat this problem by exploiting its rich hydropower resources, he said.
Ding Yexian, deputy governor of Tibet, said last month that by the end of 2015 the region's power generation installed capacity would more than double to 2.6 gigawatts (GW), up from 1.16 GW by the end of 2011. He added that the remaining 14.3 percent of the population currently without access to the regional power grid would be connected over the same time period.
-WV
