China Power Market Trading Jumps 19.2% in Eight Months

China’s national electricity market traded 5,180 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) in the first eight months of 2026, up 19.2% year-on-year, according to data released by the National Energy Administration (NEA) and reported by Xinhua News. The figures point to rising activity in the country’s power trading market and growing electricity demand as the world’s second-largest economy deepens market-oriented reforms in its energy sector.

Context

China has been steadily building a “national unified electricity market” as part of its broader push to let supply and demand, rather than administrative quotas, set power prices. Market-based trading accounted for about 61 percent of national electricity consumption in 2024, and the share is expected to climb further. In February 2025, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the NEA issued a notice requiring that new-energy on-grid electricity, in principle, fully enter the electricity market, with prices formed through competitive trading — a shift China Daily described as a milestone toward a unified national market.

Key Developments

Within the cumulative total, trading by scope showed intra-provincial transactions at 4,026.4 billion kWh, up 21.5%, while inter-provincial and cross-regional trading reached 1,153.6 billion kWh, up 12.1%. By product type, medium- and long-term trading accounted for 4,617.3 billion kWh, with spot trading at 562.7 billion kWh. Green power trading totaled 218.2 billion kWh, up 6.1%, while grid companies’ market-based agency purchasing came to 563.8 billion kWh.

Single-month data for August 2026 highlighted a similar pattern: total traded volume was 754.8 billion kWh, up 15.2% year-on-year, with intra-provincial trading at 563.8 billion kWh (+16.0%) and inter-provincial trading at 191.0 billion kWh (+11.4%). The August figures were reported by Phoenix News, citing the NEA.

The trajectory also reveals a notable deceleration in cumulative growth over the year. According to the NEA’s earlier release, covered by CCTV News, cumulative traded volume through July stood at 4,425.2 billion kWh, up 23.4% year-on-year — meaning growth through August slowed to 19.2% as the year progressed. The official NEA release on the July data is available here.

Analysis

The divergence between intra-provincial and cross-provincial trading is one of the most telling features of the data. Intra-provincial transactions still account for roughly 78% of the total, a sign that a genuinely nationwide market remains under construction even as headline volumes climb. Cross-regional trading grew at less than half the pace of trading within provinces, suggesting that barriers to moving power across provincial boundaries have yet to be fully dismantled.

The slowdown in cumulative growth — from 24.8% in the January-to-May period to 19.2% by August — may partly reflect base effects, as 2025 saw unusually rapid expansion of market-based trading. But it also raises questions about whether trading activity is settling into a more mature, moderating phase.

Electricity demand drivers are shifting. Data from the NEA’s first-quarter briefing, detailed by Daily Economic News, showed that internet data services — the backbone of the AI industry — consumed 22.9 billion kWh in the first quarter, up 44.0% year-on-year, while EV charging and battery-swap services used 37.6 billion kWh, up 53.8%. Together, those two categories lifted nationwide electricity consumption by 0.8 percentage points.

Green power remains the laggard. Green power trading grew just 6.1% in the eight-month period, far below the overall market’s 19.2% pace — a reminder that the green certificate and green power segment is still comparatively small and immature despite heavy policy emphasis.

What’s Next

China’s electricity market figures will remain a closely watched barometer of both industrial activity and the pace of the country’s market-oriented power reforms. The coming months will indicate whether the deceleration in trading growth is a temporary base effect or the start of a more sustained cooling. Just as important will be whether cross-provincial trading begins to close the gap with intra-provincial activity — the clearest test of whether China’s vision of a truly unified national electricity market is taking hold.