Starting Wednesday, the Beijing municipal government will publish forecasts for the city's power supply and demand levels for the next day with alerts marked in yellow, orange and red, the Beijing Daily reported Wednesday.

The power shortage alert, based on the predicted maximum electricity consumption load and the generation capacity of the North China Power Grid Co., will be released by the Beijing Municipal Commission of Development and Reform every day.

The alerts of yellow, orange or red respectively signal a powershortage below 300,000 kilowatts, between 300,000 to 700,000 kilowatts and above 700,000 kilowatts.

"The power grade will help businesses better prepare for emergency plans and avoid peak hours," said an official with the commission.

Emergency measures will be taken during orange and red alerts, the commission said.

China has been experiencing the most severe power shortage since the 1980s, with demand exceeding supply by more than 30 million kilowatts this summer. The country's electricity demand increased about 16 percent in the first six months of this year over the same period last year.

Twenty-four Chinese provinces and municipalities have imposed power brownouts so far this year, including Beijing, which experienced a 47-minute brownout in July. And from July 15 to Aug.15, more than 6,000 businesses in Beijing are taking vacation by turns, in an effort to reduce power consumption during peak hours in the scorching summer.

The capital has also introduced other measures such as promoting working on weekends to spread power consumption more evenly throughout the week.

Source: Xinhua