China Grid Growth Continues

Nonferrous metals will continue to be absorbed by electrical power upgrades being made by China’s government.

Following the recent commissioning of a 1,000-kilovolt transmission line in the southeast, China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has approved the second round of ultra-high-voltage transmission projects, which were announced in late August.

According to Industrial Info Resources (IIR), Sugar Land, Texas, among the second batch of projects is a 750-kilovolt transmission project in Xinjiang and several 500-kilovolt transmission projects in the Inner Mongolia region and Yunnan. The project in Xinjiang involves the construction of four transformer substations with a total capacity of 5,500 megavolt-amperes and more than 800 miles of transmission line.

The State Grid Corp., Beijing, will reportedly invest more than $14.7 billion for the construction of ultra high voltage transmission projects in next three to four years. It is expected that the total investment of the State Grid in ultra high voltage transmission projects will surpass $87.7 billion by 2020, according to Yinbiao Shu, vice president of the State Grid Corp. of China, at a conference at which he was speaking in Beijing.

IIR also has reported that in July 2009, China's power generation output reached 334.5 billion kilowatt-hours, an increase of 4.8 percent year-over-year and 0.4 percent higher than the previous month.