At present, it is the peak of electricity consumption in the "peak summer", and multiple factors such as the impact of large-scale high temperature weather have led to the continuous tight supply and demand of the coal market, and there is much discussion in the industry. Will coal prices keep rising? Can the summer coal supply keep up? With these questions in mind, the China Economic Herald reporter interviewed people from many industries in the industry and relevant responsible persons of national ministries and commissions.
According to the data, on July 14, the national power generation reached 27.187 billion kWh, and the highest electricity load in the country reached 1.192 billion kW, both of which hit a record high. "This is a special state of electricity consumption in hot weather." Li Zhongmin, deputy general manager of the National Coal Trading Center, believes that the temperature is relatively high every summer, and the electricity consumption from industrial production to residential consumption will be relatively increased. In addition, since 2021, China's economy has continued to recover steadily, industrial production has recovered relatively well, and coal consumption has been higher than that of the same period last year.
"Recently, the consumption of thermal coal has begun to decline and decline, and the supply of coal in the peak summer is sufficiently guaranteed." The relevant person in charge of the Operation Bureau of the National Development and Reform Commission told the China Economic Herald that the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments continue to promote the construction of coal production, supply, storage and marketing systems, and the supply capacity continues to increase, providing strong support for ensuring the need for coal consumption in the peak summer. The above-mentioned person in charge revealed that even when the national unified dispatch power plant consumption reached a historical peak of 7.47 million tons on July 15, there was no coal shortage shutdown nationwide, and the power plant inventory remained at a reasonable level. The person in charge pointed out that on the whole, a variety of energy synergies are full of power, and in the case of primary energy, water and wind and photovoltaic resources, it is expected that the maximum daily electricity demand can be met by more than 27.5 billion kWh, and energy demand such as electricity during peak periods can be effectively guaranteed.
Social coal storage is far greater than the gap
Every summer when electricity is peaked, the phenomenon of coal in short supply occurs from time to time, and this year is the same. In the first half of the year, the added value of industries above designated size in the country increased by 15.9% year-on-year, an average growth of 7.0% in two years, and the industry continued to recover rapidly, according to estimates, driving energy consumption in the first half of the year to increase by 10.5% year-on-year, the electricity consumption of the whole society increased by 16.2% year-on-year, and coal consumption also showed a substantial increase, with an increase of more than 200 million tons.
In July, thermal coal consumption was strong, reaching a historical peak of more than 7.4 million tons, and the supply capacity of the national unified power plant also reached an average of 6.5 million tons per day. "During this seasonal peak period of coal consumption and electricity consumption, the short-term market tight situation is also a perennial market change law, and there is no need to amplify this phenomenon at all." Li Xin, chairman of the China Coal Economic Research Association, believes that in the first half of the year, thanks to the effective release of advanced production capacity and the promotion of intelligent mining in coal mines, the output of coal production enterprises above designated size in China increased by 6.4%, which strongly supported the demand for coal in economic development. He said that in terms of the supply capacity of the unified power plant, in mid-August 2020, the daily average was about 5.9 million tons; by the middle of July this year, the coal supply level had exceeded the daily average of 6.4 million tons, an increase of 8.6%. He revealed that the recent coal consumption is about 6.5 million tons, down 1 million tons from the peak point, and the current supply capacity is even more problematic.
"Light storage and high consumption" is the industry's practice. For the recent interpretation of some market participants that the power plant replenishment inventory is "the lack of coal in the market", Li Xin is not impressed: "From the perspective of the power industry at the main consumer end of coal, in the past peak summer period, there was a practice of replenishing the warehouse in advance. He said that last year, for example, when the peak period of coal consumption came, the inventory of power enterprises reached 140 million tons; subsequently, the daily consumption fell, the inventory fell synchronously, and the high coal supply and high inventory continued throughout the peak summer period. However, this situation has also caused a large number of funds and waste of resources of power enterprises, with the scientific inventory management of enterprises and the continuous improvement of coal supply capacity, the inventory concept of coal terminals is also changing.
"The National Development and Reform Commission has recently proposed to implement differentiated inventory management (7 to 12 days in the peak season) for coal consumption of power enterprises, which is an important measure to be closer to the market, stabilize the market, and reduce the burden on enterprises." Li Xin revealed that the supply and consumption difference in recent days has been about 500,000 tons. According to the state's calculation that it will continue to put 10 million tons of reserves into the market, if the daily supply and consumption difference of 500,000 tons can cover 20 days of coal demand, this has not yet taken into account the normal storage space of nearly 30 million tons of power enterprises in the peak period. "Therefore, it is capable and guaranteed to meet the demand for thermal coal in the peak summer of the power industry." Li Xin said.
Li Xin said that China has laid out more than 50 government coal reserve bases involving more than 50 government coal reserve bases in 23 provinces, relying on central enterprises such as National Energy, China Coal Group, Huaneng Group, Huadian Group, Datang Group, and large local state-owned enterprises and third-party logistics parks such as Shaanxi Coal Group, Xiangneng Group, and Sichuan Coal Group, relying on the national energy, China Coal Group, Huaneng Group, and Datang Group. It has greatly improved the efficiency of coal supply to terminal enterprises. At present, the state-level reserve base has formed a government-dispatchable reserve capacity of 100 million tons, which effectively supplements the total amount of social inventory, increases the resilience and elasticity of supply, and makes up for the imbalance in regional coal storage caused by different consumption intensities.
In fact, for the coal market, there is a more important safeguard measure - the medium- and long-term contract system for coal. "More than 80% of thermal coal has signed medium- and long-term contracts, and these capacities are also guaranteed." Li Zhongmin introduced that from the monitoring situation of the national coal trading center, the current redemption rate of medium- and long-term contracts is generally above 90%, which can completely stabilize the "basic disk". Li Zhongmin further analyzed that the current high coal prices are not due to insufficient release of policy signals, but a small amount of market coal and a small number of power plants have not signed medium- and long-term contracts, coupled with some traders have hoarding behavior, resulting in the entire market misjudged price expectations. On the whole, in fact, coal prices have long been stable through the China Long-term Association, and the low coal stock in the market is easy to be speculated, which cannot represent the real state of the entire market.
High-quality advanced production capacity is continuously released
According to the Data Bureau of Statistics, In the first half of 2021, China's raw coal production was 1.95 billion tons, an increase of 6.4% year-on-year, and the coal supply was generally stable, of which high-quality advanced production capacity played a huge role in ensuring supply. Among them, in the first half of this year, the country added 140 million tons of high-quality advanced production capacity / year, and in the second half of the year, nearly 110 million tons / year will be added to timely supplement market supply.
Shandong Energy Group, one of the largest enterprises in Shandong Province, currently has 19 coal mines with a production capacity of more than 5 million tons / year, with a total production capacity of about 187.9 million tons / year. Yin Dewei, the relevant person in charge of the investment and development department of Shandong Energy Group, said, "From what we have learned recently, the inventory of power plants has always remained at the appropriate level, and no shortage of coal has been found. ”
Yin Dewei introduced that in the first half of the year, the raw coal production in Ordos region increased to a certain extent compared with the same period last year, a large number of open-pit coal mines were approved for temporary land, and a number of completed acceptance coal mines and newly processed mining certificate coal mines were put into production, with a total production capacity of more than 150 million tons / year, including the Junger Banner Jinzhengtai Coal Mine, which belongs to Shandong Energy Group, with a production capacity of 3 million tons / year.
According to reports, Shandong Energy Group closely focuses on the task of increasing production and supply, optimizing the layout of coal production, maximizing production potential, ensuring market supply, and producing a total of 104.95 million tons of raw coal in the first half of this year. In the second half of the year, with the acceleration of the procedures for the construction of coal mines, the strengthening of safety control measures, the gradual advancement of the relocation of coal-pressing villages, the improvement of the degree of intelligent construction of mines, and the implementation of high-quality production capacity during the period of increasing production and supply, it is expected to release the potential of 30 million tons of production increase.
In order to reduce the frequency of phased coal shortages and keep coal supply and prices stable for a long time, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments have recently issued long-term safeguard measures such as adding advanced coal production capacity and enhancing reserve capacity, aiming to further improve coal supply capacity through a combination of short-term and long-term safeguard measures.
On the one hand, the capacity of coal reserves has been continuously enhanced. At present, China has promoted the capacity building of coal reserves, and after years of construction, it has formed a government dispatchable reserve capacity of 100 million tons, mainly distributed in coal production distribution centers, consumption concentrations, major railway transportation nodes and receiving and unloading ports. Since the beginning of this year, according to the needs of the coal supply and demand situation, China has put more than 5 million tons of national coal reserves into the market four times, and will continue to put 10 million tons of reserves into the market to ensure the stable supply of coal.
On the other hand, the supplementary effect of imported coal is obvious. In view of the reduction of coal import resources this year, the relevant parties of the state encourage domestic enterprises to dock foreign resources as soon as possible, lock in resources and prices in advance, and China's coal imports in June were 28.392 million tons, an increase of 12.3% year-on-year. According to the import coal order situation, it is expected to maintain a continuous growth trend in July and August, and it is expected to exceed 30 million tons in July, which can better supplement the domestic coal supply.
In addition, in the face of a wide range of extreme rainfall in Henan on July 20, the supply of electricity, coal and other supplies was affected, the National Development and Reform Commission quickly organized relevant parties to actively respond, increase cross-provincial support, and make every effort to ensure the stable supply of coal, electricity, oil and gas in Henan Province. Through the joint efforts of all parties, as of 8 o'clock on the 21st, about 2/3 of the important users have restored power supply, and the rest of the power users are making every effort to repair it.
The capacity of clean energy power generation has been significantly improved
On July 19, Jin Xiandong, director of the Political Research Office of the National Development and Reform Commission and spokesman of the National Development and Reform Commission, said at a regular press conference in July that the National Development and Reform Commission will focus on improving the power generation and supply capacity of various types of power sources, promote the timely commissioning of important new power sources, and guide local governments and enterprises to promote the full generation of clean energy such as hydropower, nuclear power, wind power, and solar power generation. According to reports, in the first half of this year, the country's industrial power generation above designated size increased by 13.7% year-on-year. Among them, thermal power, hydropower, nuclear power, wind power and solar power generation increased by 15.0%, 1.4%, 13.7%, 26.6% and 9% respectively year-on-year. In June, power generation increased by 7.4% year-on-year. In June this year, the National Development and Reform Commission approved a total of 7 fixed asset investment projects, with a total investment of 38.9 billion yuan, mainly concentrated in energy, water conservancy and other industries.
With the technological progress and accelerated decline of renewable energy technologies such as wind power and photovoltaic power generation, the green and low-carbon transformation of energy has become the trend of the times. At the 2021 International Energy Reform Dialogue Conference held recently, Zhang Jianhua, director of the National Energy Administration, said that in 2020, China's non-fossil energy accounted for 15.9% of primary energy consumption, which has reached the world average, and the proportion of coal consumption has dropped to 56.8%; the supply capacity of clean energy has continued to improve, and many indicators such as hydropower, wind power, photovoltaics, and the installed capacity of nuclear power under construction will remain the world's first. By the end of 2020, the installed capacity of clean energy power generation will increase to 1.083 billion kilowatts, accounting for nearly 50% of the total installed capacity。
Not only that, gas and coal power have further formed complementary supports. At present, the installed capacity of gas and power is close to 100 million kilowatts, and coal power has built the world's largest clean coal power supply system by eliminating backward units and continuously optimizing the installed structure, and has strengthened the support capacity of power supply through the optimization and complementarity of gas and coal resources.
In terms of strengthening the supply of natural gas, the relevant departments of the state have organized PetroChina, Sinopec and CNOOC to do a good job in the safe and stable production and production of oil and gas fields, and domestic gas has maintained a high level of about 580 million cubic meters per day; imported pipeline gas has stabilized at a high level of 170 million cubic meters per day; LNG receiving stations have sufficient receiving and unloading capacity, with an average daily supply of more than 350 million cubic meters; the management and storage have maintained a high level and the adjustable capacity is strong; and the major underground gas storage reservoirs are filled with gas according to the planned schedule. At present, the supply of natural gas is sufficient and stable, providing sufficient resource guarantee for gas-fired power generation in some parts of the south, and effectively ensuring the demand for gas for peak power generation in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai and Guangdong, which are major provinces of gas and power.
The synergy of multiple energy sources also works together to ensure energy demand such as electricity during peak periods. Since the peak of the summer, from the perspective of the maximum power generation in a single day, coal-fired units are about 16.9 billion kWh, gas and electricity are 970 million kWh, hydropower is 5.43 billion kWh, nuclear power is stable at about 1.18 billion kWh, and wind power and photovoltaics total 3.13 billion kWh. On the whole, a variety of energy synergies are more than full, and in the case of primary energy, water and wind and photovoltaic resources are more ideal, energy demand such as electricity during peak periods can be effectively guaranteed. These measures will also greatly alleviate the peak of phased coal consumption and promote the stability and long-term development of the coal market. (Author: Guo Dingyuan China Economic Herald China Development Network reporter)
Source: National Development and Reform Commission