The firm, operating most grid networks in southern provinces of Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Yunnan and Hainan, said in a report on its website that it planned more than 500 billion yuan of capital expenditure in the five years from 2011 to 2015.

The whole region will need 60 gigawatts (GW) of new generating capacity in the coming five years and the transmission capacity from Guizhou, Yunnan and Guangxi to Guangdong will increase by 17.3 GW during the same period, the grid firm said.

It also expected power generating capacity from non-fossil fuels in the whole region it covers will increase to 48.4 percent of its total, and output to rise to 43.3 percent by the end of 2015.

The output will account for 21.9 percent of primary energy consumption in the region by 2015, 5 percentage points higher than at the end of 2010, it said.

The grid had forecast 6 GW of power shortages in the region in 2011 due to insufficient generating capacity and other reasons.

But the province of Guangdong alone has also forecast 6 GW of power deficits in the second and third quarters due to growing demand, the official Xinhua News Agency reported on the weekend.

Guangdong had forecast 4 GW of power shortages in the first quarter.

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