"As China's energy transformation continues to accelerate and the power system reform enters a 'deep water period', the national unified power market urgently needs to be transformed from large to strong and from omni-directional excellence." On March 26, Yang Kun, Secretary of the Party Committee and Executive Vice Chairman of the China Electric Power Council, said at the 2024 Economic Situation and Power Development Analysis and Forecasting Meeting.

According to Yang Kun, China's electricity market has made great achievements. In 2023, the amount of electricity traded in the national market was about 5.7 trillion kilowatt-hours, an increase of 7.9 percent over the same period last year, accounting for 61.4 percent of the electricity consumption of the whole society, an increase of 0.6 percentage points over 2022. There are a total of 743000 registered market entities on all power trading platforms, an increase of 28.3% over the same period last year. The pattern of multiple competitive entities has initially taken shape, and the scale of the electricity market has expanded steadily. In addition, the trading mechanism of China's electricity market has been continuously improved. In 2023, the electricity price policy of coal power capacity was introduced, which promoted the transformation of coal power to both basic security power and system regulatory power. New energy has gradually entered the electricity market, with 684.5 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity traded on the market, accounting for 47.3% of the total new energy generation. A nationwide trading rule system to promote effective competition has been basically formed. Electric power medium-and long-term, auxiliary service market to achieve full coverage. In 2023, medium-and long-term trading electricity accounted for more than 90% of market-oriented electricity, and the auxiliary service market tapped the market peak regulation potential of more than 117 million kilowatts and increased clean energy consumption by 120 billion kilowatt-hours. The pilot project of the electric power spot market has progressed steadily, 23 provinces have launched the electric power spot market operation, Shanxi and Guangdong provinces have been put into formal operation, and the southern regional power spot market has realized regional settlement and trial operation for the first time, which has played a positive role in optimizing the allocation of resources.

"Deepening the reform of the power system is an urgent task related to China's energy security and overall economic and social development." Yang Kun said,"In view of the need to further clarify the synergy between China's multi-level electricity market, the pace of new energy entering the market in various places lacks coordination, barriers to cross-provincial electricity transactions still exist, medium-and long-term and spot transactions need to be further connected, and wholesale market price signals have not really been transmitted to retail users, and it is still difficult to scientifically allocate and channel auxiliary service costs. The green value of new energy and the flexible adjustment value of gas, electricity and new energy storage have not yet been reasonably reflected. The electricity-carbon market needs to be deeply integrated. Therefore, the national unified electricity market urgently needs to be transformed from large to strong and from omni-directional excellence."

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作者：苏伟编辑：张宇校对：孔欣慰