China's total power consumption in the first eight months rose 0.36 percent to 2.34 trillion kilowatt hours from the same period last year, said China's National Energy Administration (NEA) on Monday.

This is the first time that accumulative power consumption to grow year on year in 2009, said NEA.

Power consumption in August rose 8.22 percent to 346.22 billion kilowatt hours from the same period last year. The figure was 1.23 percent more than that of June.

China's power consumption resumed a month-on-month pick-up in April.

The year-on-year growth rate was 2.22 percentage points up from that of July, but the month-on-month growth rate was 9.67 percentage points down from that of July.

Power consumption of the primary industry which covers agriculture, animal husbandry and fishery, added 6.29 percent to 64.14 billion kilowatt hours in August year on year and that of the service sector climbed 10.70 percent to 255.52 billion kilowatt hours in August year on year. But the power use of industry dipped 2.84 percent to 1.72 trillion kilowatt hours in August year on year.

"It's not surprising to see China's power use climb. Chinese August economic data released last week showed the country's economy has been recovering. Chinese enterprises are adding investment to expand production and thus have used more power," said Zhuang Jian, a senior economist with the Asian Development Bank.

"It also provided evidence that China's economy is recovering," he said.

(Xinhua News Agency September 14, 2009)