CDB issued special loans of 123 billion yuan to support energy and power supply

Implementing the decisions and instructions of the Central Committee of the CPC and the State Council, China Development Bank (CDB) has put the support of energy supply as a priority in serving the national strategies since last September. Mobilizing the resources across the bank, CDB has kept increasing its support and offered special loans of 123 billion yuan to ensure energy supply up to now, which not only supported coal enterprises to increase production and supply, involving coal production capacity of about 1 billion tons, but also boosted procurement of thermal coal of coal-fired power enterprises, increasing more than 10 days of coal storage for the national installed capacities of coal-fired plants.

Since the second half of last year, there has been a shortage of energy and power supply in many parts of the country. In early September last year, CDB created a special loan scheme to provide targeted support to major coal-producing areas and key coal enterprises to increase the supply of thermal coal, and to support coal reserve of key power enterprises in key areas of power and heating supply. It made great efforts to alleviate the operating difficulties of coal and power enterprises, and provided financial services for ensuring energy and power supply.

During the implementation, CDB established a quick response mechanism, and opened up a green channel to speed up the approval process of such special loans, giving priority to the process of project submission, credit review, investigation and deliberation, and contract approval. It also improved differentiated pricing policies to effectively reduce financing costs for the suppliers. At the same time, CDB strictly controlled project access, and strengthened credit management and fund supervision to ensure that loans were used for energy and power supply, firmly guarding the bottom line of risks.

At present, while helping alleviate the short-term funding pressure of supply enterprises, CDB took a long-term prospective to make advantage of the targeted re-lending program of the People’s Bank of China (PBC) in support of clean and efficient use of coal. It helped improve the industrial structure of the coal and power industry, and provided financial support to the safe, efficient, green and intelligent coal mining, and the clean and efficient coal processing and utilization of coal power, promoting green and low-carbon transformation of the energy structure.

As CDB officials said, the bank would fully implement the new development philosophy in an all-round and accurate manner. Based on the resource condition that China is rich in coal but poor in petroleum and natural gas, in accordance with the national planning and arrangement for realizing carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals, CDB insisted on laying equal emphasis on business development and risk control, continued to promote high-quality targeted loans in support of the energy and power supply. Taking advantage of the targeted re-lending program of the PBC, it supported the clean and efficient use of coal, and coordinated efforts to reduce carbon emissions and pollution and boost green growth, making new contributions to ensuring China’s energy security and people’s wellbeing.