National Energy Administration: The central government invested 36.1 billion yuan to support the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids

(Reporter Lu Yanan) At a policy briefing held by the State Council Information Office a few days ago, Qi Chengyuan, deputy director of the National Energy Administration, revealed that in order to ensure the completion of a new round of rural power grid transformation and upgrading tasks this year, investment will be increased. This year, the central investment plan for rural power grid transformation and upgrading in 2019 is 36.1 billion yuan, of which 14 billion yuan will be invested within the central budget, all of which will be used in poverty-stricken areas. At the same time, power grid companies and local governments will be urged to increase their financial investment.

Electricity is an important foundation for poverty alleviation. Preferential support has been given to the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in poor areas, especially in deeply impoverished areas, and initial results have been achieved. Qi Chengyuan introduced that in order to accelerate the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in deeply impoverished areas, the National Energy Administration implemented a three-year action plan for the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in the "three regions and three prefectures" (2018-2020), involving 8,769 administrative villages in 210 counties and 181 companies in 32 regiments of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, benefiting 25.42 million people; organizing Tibet to compile an implementation plan for the last isolated grid county to accelerate the networking process of isolated grid counties; strengthening rural grid access to photovoltaic poverty alleviation projects. As of the end of 2018, 26 provinces across the country had connected rural grids to 19.3 million kilowatts of photovoltaic poverty alleviation projects, benefiting about 2.6 million poor households.

Qi Chengyuan said that this year, the central budget will also increase the support for rural power grid transformation in poor areas. The proportion of central funds used in the deep poverty areas of the "three regions and three prefectures" increased from 50.9% in 2018 to 64.9% in 2019. The central capital will give priority to the "three regions and three prefectures" and clearly stipulate that the proportion of central capital for the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in Tibet is 80%, and the proportion of central capital for the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in the Tibetan areas of four provinces (Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu, and Qinghai), 54 poor counties and border counties in Xinjiang, and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps is 50%. This year, the proportion of central capital for the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids in the "three prefectures" of Liangshan, Sichuan, Nujiang, Yunnan, and Linxia, ​​Gansu will be increased from 20% to 50%.

The transformation and upgrading of rural power grids will help fill the gaps in rural infrastructure and drive social investment and the development of related industries. Qi Chengyuan introduced that the total investment in the transformation and upgrading of rural power grids is expected to reach 830 billion yuan from 2016 to 2019, of which 43.5 billion yuan is from the central budget, which will drive the investment of about 787 billion yuan from corporate funds, bank funds and local fiscal funds.

The transformation of rural power grids has significantly boosted rural electricity consumption. In 2018, rural electricity consumption reached 2.46 trillion kWh, an increase of 30% over 2015. The average annual growth rate from 2016 to 2018 was 9%, three percentage points higher than the growth rate of electricity consumption in the whole society during the same period. Among them, rural residents' daily electricity consumption was 527.4 billion kWh, and the average daily electricity consumption per household was 1,400 kWh, an increase of 31.6% and 24.5% respectively over 2015, indicating that the level and capacity of rural power grid construction infrastructure have improved, providing the necessary conditions for expanding rural farmers' daily production electricity consumption.