"12Th Five-Year" Will Re Open The Curtain Of Energy Price And Energy System Reform

　　 The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China has made twelfth plans for formulating national economic and social development. "12th Five-Year" The plan suggests that we should deepen the reform of resource product prices and factor market, straighten out the price relations of resources such as coal, electricity, oil, gas, water and mineral resources, and improve the forming mechanism of important commodities, services and factor prices.

Coal and electricity are listed. Energy price reform In the first two categories, some analysts believe that the state of rationalizing the price of coal and electricity has come to an end. The contradiction between "market coal" and "planned electricity" for many years is urgently needed to find a breakthrough, otherwise it will affect the normal development of the industry.

In October 30th, a report issued by the China Electric Power Federation (CIC) pointed out that, due to the fact that coal and electricity prices had not been straightened out and coal prices were rising, all the thermal power enterprises in 10 provinces were all losing money. The power generation enterprises were faced with the risk of gold chain breakage due to losses, and at the moment when the heating period in the North was approaching the power plant in winter, but some power plants had no money to buy coal, which might not guarantee the risk of power and heat supply.

Promoting the price reform of coal and power resources has become the consensus of the industry. Jiang Bing, director of the development and Planning Department of the State Energy Bureau, pointed out that during the "12th Five-Year" period, we will promote the scientific development of the energy sector through promoting the reform of the energy system, improving the market operation mechanism, improving the management of energy investment, strengthening the guidance of energy tax and fiscal policy, and strengthening the legislative and industrial management.

That means energy prices and energy. Structural reform The national development and Reform Commission (SDRC) and the SASAC have already started work related to energy system and price reform, but the National Energy Bureau, as the energy department, has not become the main body of the leading reform.

　　 Origin of reform

CLP calls for further reform of electricity price in the report: first, in the process of forming a reasonable electricity pricing mechanism, it will continue to adhere to the principles and mechanisms of coal electricity linkage and solve the problem of long term upside down of thermoelectric price. Two, we need to increase the demand side management, give full play to the guidance and adjustment function of price to demand, straighten out the parity relationship between various terminal energy sources, and guide users to consume various kinds of energy reasonably. Three, we should speed up the pace of reform of the pricing mechanism of resource products, and study the scientific and reasonable pricing mechanism in line with market rules and adapt to China's national conditions as soon as possible.

The coal electricity linkage mechanism was actually formed as early as 2004, when the state fully liberalized the price of electricity coal, in order to straighten out the price relationship between coal and electricity, and promote the coordinated and sustainable development of the coal and power industry, the coal and electricity price linkage was promulgated after the approval of the State Council.

In May 2005 and June 2006, the national development and Reform Commission (NDRC) organized the coal electricity price linkage for the two time, raising the total sales price nationwide by an average of 5.02 cents per kilowatt hour.

But later, the linkage mechanism failed to continue to implement. In 2007, the price of electricity coal continued to rise, and rose by more than 5% of the coal electricity price linkage mechanism. However, in order to slow down the impact of electricity price adjustment on CPI, there was no coal electricity price linkage policy.

Since 2008, the price of electric coal has been rising sharply. The state has raised the electricity price two times in July 1st and August 20th of the same year, but because of the inflationary pressure at that time, the sales price had not been adjusted until 2009.

But in fact, there are still some problems in the implementation of coal electricity price linkage. Taking the coal link as an example, China's coal price is not entirely formed by the market, the structural contradiction of coal is prominent, and the coal price information system is not perfect.

"Power generation links, coal prices are determined every year, the fluctuation is too large, and the linkage mechanism of coal and electricity prices can not reflect the actual situation very well. It is difficult for power generation enterprises to accept 30% digestibility." The report of the State Grid Energy Research Institute said. {page_break}

In fact, in addition to the above two links, the electricity sales link has no restrictions on the sales price increase, and there is no clear measure to adjust the electricity price structure. In the linkage of the price of electricity and coal prices, there is a greater pressure to synchronously implement the electricity price linkage.

This also means that the coal electricity price linkage mechanism is "malfunctioning" under certain conditions, and the electricity and coal industries are not satisfied. In addition, the oil price mechanism and the natural gas price mechanism are also facing pressure from public opinion. The NDRC has made public statements and is studying some defects in the pricing mechanism of refined oil.

　　 Direction of reform

Experts once suggested that China's current coal and electricity price linkage plan can be based on Japan and the United States experience. It is understood that Japan is currently implementing the "fuel fee adjustment system", corresponding to fuel costs changes, charges every three months for an automatic adjustment, each adjustment based on the Customs Statistics released in the last quarter of the import price of all kinds of fuel 3 months average value as the basis.

In the United States, the price of electricity and electricity are divided into two parts: base price and fuel adjustment cost before bidding for power generation.

A long-term research expert on energy in the United States said in an interview with the newspaper that the basic price is approved by the federal government, the fuel cost of the electricity price is fluctuated, and the fuel adjustment cost of the selling price is linked to the fuel adjustment cost of the power plant.

"After bidding for power generation, the transmission of coal and other major power generation fuel prices to the electricity price depends mainly on market forces, and fuel adjustment fees are set in the sales price, which reflects the impact of changes in fuel prices on electricity prices." The experts said.

But in China's energy supply, taking coal as an example, in the transportation sector, because of the tight railway capacity and other reasons, the two sides of coal and electricity have to bear the "gray freight" beyond the state's approved Railway Tariff, which is almost known as the "hidden rules" in the coal and electricity industry.

In the "12th Five-Year plan" proposal, it was clearly proposed that we should strengthen the construction of modern energy industry and comprehensive transport system, promote the transformation of energy production and utilization mode, and build a safe, stable, economic and clean modern energy industry system.

"If we really need to straighten out the price mechanism of coal and electricity, we should set up an intervention mechanism for abnormal fluctuations in electricity prices in the coal sector, and adopt various supporting policies and measures to stabilize coal prices and curb unreasonable fluctuations in the price of electricity coal." An expert from the State Grid Energy Research Institute said.

However, the energy field generally believes that measures such as reducing the government's intervention in coal prices, timely levying special proceeds for the coal industry, separating the government from enterprises in the coal industry, reforming the distribution mode of railway transport capacity, establishing a unified national electricity market, and establishing a coal price information system and index system to stabilize coal prices.

"This is the fundamental solution to the contradiction between coal and electricity, but all these work need to coordinate many departments and industries, and it is not easy to do it." The experts said.

The electricity price adjustment will not only reflect the price of coal, but also include changes in the price of natural gas and nuclear fuel. In addition to the price of electricity coal, the linkage standard of electricity price can be determined through the rational determination of fuel price, fuel calorific value and power consumption level.

Therefore, experts from the State Grid Energy Research Institute believe that the use of electricity price changes and the synchronous adjustment of electricity prices should be adopted, and the application scope of sales price linkage should be extended to the linkage of nuclear power and renewable energy tariff.

"At the same time, the transmission and distribution price standard of power grid operation enterprises should be reasonably approved according to the international pricing mechanism of transmission and distribution price." The experts believe that, as at present, because the separation of main and auxiliary power grid enterprises has not yet been completed, the transmission and distribution tariff can not be truly accounted for. This link still needs time.

The experts further suggested that the electricity price should be set up according to the price of the air ticket "fuel surcharge", and the customer tariff should be divided into two parts: normal electricity price and fuel surcharge. "Changes in fuel prices will directly reflect changes in surcharges." The experts finally said.