23-07-04 The latest statistics from China's State Development and Reform Commission (SDRC) in Beijing showed that China's energy supply and transportation capacity grew a relatively big amount in the first half of this year.
From January to June, China produced 743 mm tons of coal, 14.9 % more than that of the same time of last year. The electricity supply grew 15.8 % on a year-on-year basis to 990.9 bn kWh.

China also increased its crude oil production to 85.71 mm tons and imported 56.34 mm tons in the first half of the year, up 1.9 % and 40.3 % respectively, according to SDRC statistics. The country's refined crude oil jumped to 133.9 mm tons, growing 17. 9 % when compared with the same time of last year.
The transportation capacity of Chinese railway grew to 1.056 bn tons, an increase of 8.7 %. According to the statistics, transportation for coal reached 481 mm tons during the time.

However, Zhou Hongren, an SDRC official, warned that China's power shortage still bottlenecks the national economic growth.
According to his prediction, China would probably suffer from a power shortage of 30 mm kWh in the third quarter of 2004.