Regulators in Yunnan province have warned aluminium producers powered by hydropower sources to keep average monthly outputs at August levels for the remainder of the year.
A document from the Yunnan Development and Reform Commission obtained by Reuters ordered the cuts, which come on top of 1 million metric tons per annum of capacity that have already been eliminated from local aluminium smelters’ production. Cuts began in May due to drought, which limited the supply of hydropower resources.
also instructed coal-fired plants to reduce operational hours, but it did not give specific instructions on how low it should go.
Yunnan province is cutting power consumption in part due to missed energy consumption targets and persistent power shortages. Three-quarters of Yunnan’s power supplies are from renewable hydropower sources, but these sources typically have a decreased output in the winter months.
The provincial government also directed steel producers to ramp down production over the final months of the year by adjusting production schedules. A portion of September’s crude steel production would be bumped to November and December, per the document.
Steel producers in Yunnan province produce 2.3 percent of China’s total steel output.
Yunnan’s government also directed cement output to be limited for the remainder of the year, cutting September production by better than 80 percent from August’s total. Yunnan churned out 129.85 million metric tons of cement last year, which accounts for about 5.5 percent of the Middle Kingdom’s total