OREANDA-NEWS. June 24, 2011. China's top economic planner on Thursday reiterated a ban on favourable power tariffs for power-intensive sectors as the world's second-largest electricity consumer struggles to deal with its worst power crisis in seven years.
Last year, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) asked local governments and power suppliers to cancel favourable power prices for aluminium, ferroalloy and calcium carbide makers, and said preferential power rates for direct trade between power generators and power users but without approval must be halted.

"However, in some areas parties are trying to resume favourable power tariffs through various means," the NDRC said in a notice on its website (www.ndrc.gov.cn).

Power tariff arrangements not approved by the NDRC must stop immediately, it said, adding that only the NDRC could set on-grid power tariffs, it said.

The government last month raised power prices that grid operators charge industrial, commercial and agricultural users in 15 provinces by about 3 percent, the first increase since 2009, as it tackles widespread power shortages.