Behind the electricity reform debate: experts take the "money" of the power grid, you don't know who the letter is.

Liu Zhenya "retired" and debate on electricity reform

Without independent and impartial research to support, reforms tend to be rampant.

At the end of 2014, China's energy sector was very busy. The news of two personnel turnovers went crazy on the Internet: Nuer Becky, chairman of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, will take over as national energy director and Wu Xinxiong retires; Chen, the chairman of Datang Power Group, will take over the national grid. [Weibo] Chairman, Liu Zhenya retired.

Soon, the first boots landed, the rumors were true, but the second rumor proved to be a rumor.

The national grid has not been directly blamed. On New Year's Day, Liu Zhenya delivered a New Year message as the chairman of the State Grid and the party secretary.

The Shandong-born man, who is known as the "old Liu" by the employees inside the State Grid, is 63 years old and has been at the helm of the State Grid for ten years. Although he is low-key and rarely shows up in the media, his every move is highly regarded.

He is famous because he is in the national network's term and is highly consistent with the pace of China's power system reform. In the past ten years, according to the original reform blueprint “No. 5 Document”, the power system reform has achieved a lot of achievements, but it also stops at the imperfect “main and auxiliary separation”. The next step of "distribution and distribution" is nowhere in sight.

Some industry experts and media people blame Liu for the status quo of electricity reform. He believes that he insists on monopoly and insists on the UHV grid, which is "a roadblock to the reform and a stumbling block." Liu Zhenya’s pressure can be imagined.

In the eyes of ordinary people, monopoly is a bad thing, whether you are "administrative monopoly", "technical monopoly" or "natural monopoly". For example, the monopoly of the Ministry of Railways and PetroChina not only restrict competition, but also corrupt elements.

Thus, in the summer of 2014, the Audit Commission conducted a normal audit of the State Grid, which was interpreted by some media as “the country wants to play a big tiger”.

But if you look at Liu Zhenya’s New Year message, you know that he is doing a good job.

Liu’s dream of “communicating extra high pressure” came true. In 2014, 8 UHV projects were launched because of “governance”, including “Huainan-Nanjing-Shanghai” exchange UHV. In the industry, DC UHV is not controversial. Some experts oppose the exchange of UHV, which is considered to be prone to chain safety accidents, resulting in the integration of regional power grids, which can no longer be split.

State Grid "profits hit the best level in history", for the tenth consecutive year, won the A-level performance evaluation of the central enterprises, ranking seventh in the world's top 500 for four consecutive years.

The State Grid has won a number of scientific and technological progress awards, and it has been built as a "works miracle" in high-altitude areas. China's access to renewable energy installed capacity, the world's first. The number of patents currently owned by State Grid is ranked first among central enterprises.

There is also the "going out" of the State Grid. In the context of the repeated failure of central enterprises overseas, the State Grid has successfully operated or participated in the backbone power grids of the Philippines, Brazil, Portugal, Australia, Italy, Hong Kong and other countries. Overseas assets reached US$30.8 billion, a 17-fold increase over 2009.

State Grid has employees asking: If you are the Minister of the Central Committee or the Director of the SASAC [microblogging], what should you do in the face of such a transcript?

This question is really not a good answer. There are still many questions that are not easy to answer, such as:

You said that splitting the grid is conducive to improving efficiency and lowering electricity prices. However, some experts believe that China's electricity price is too low, thus contributing to high pollution and high energy consumption industries.

You said that the British power reform is the blueprint for China's electricity reform, but the French power company insists on the integration of transmission and distribution. Why does the industry think its efficiency is also high?

You said that the splitting of the grid is conducive to grid security, but in China, which uses a large grid system, is the safety record ranked first or behind in the world?

Do you think UHV may not be safe, but is there absolutely safety in the world?

This is reminiscent of a sentence: the critical spirit is the soul of the media industry, but the critique of the industry is the poison of the industry.

The Caijing reporter really wanted to systematically study the above problems, but found that he was caught in a bigger dilemma - you don't know who to trust.

Many Chinese power experts work in the power grid system; experts who are not working in the power grid may be funded by the power grid; even if there is no research funding for the power grid, he may seek employment in the power grid because of his children’s employment or for other reasons; Many of the think tank institutions also benefit first, and hope to earn consulting fees from the grid company.

Last month, there were a lot of talks about the introduction of the new power reform program. Many people expressed disappointment that they only engaged in online sales and did not split the power grid. In fact, even Jean Nobel, the Nobel laureate in economics, believes that in the power-selling market, a fully competitive system may be more inefficient than a monopoly system—which subverts the perception that many people “monopoly evil”.

More important than discussing Liu Zhenya’s retirement and splitting the grid is to strip the power research institute out of the grid. No one thinks that Circular 5 is an immutable imperial edict, but there is no independent and impartial research to support it. Reforms tend to go south.