China may be facing the most severe situation of power shortage since the 1980s, with a gap of 30 million kilowatts between electricity demand and supply this summer, said General Manager Zhao Xizheng of the State Power Grid Company in Beijing Wednesday.

Zhao made the remark at a meeting on summer's power supply. "Measures will be taken to enhance safe production and management over the demand side," he said.

Accelerating development of power-intensive machinery, auto, steel and manufacturing sectors, the growing pace of urbanization and low energy efficiency are blamed for China's extensive shortage of energy.

A total of 24 provincial areas imposed power brownouts in the past few months. China is now in the middle stage of industrialization phase characterized by faster development of energy-extensive machinery, auto, iron and steel sectors, said Xu Dingming, a leading official with the Energy Bureau of the State Development and Reform Commission.

Source: Xinhua