China mainly relies on domestic supply to meet energy need: Chinese premier

China mainly relied on domestic supply to meet its energy needs and had taken an active part in international energy development cooperation on the basis of mutual benefit, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said on Wednesday in Hamburg at a Sino-European economic summit.

China was a major energy consumer, but more importantly, it was a major energy producer, Wen said in a speech at the 2nd Hamburg Summit entitled "China meets Europe."

China was rich in coal deposits and two thirds of its hydropower potential remained untapped, while the development of nuclear, wind and biomass power had just started, said Wen.

In short, it had huge potential in terms of domestic energy supply, said the Premier.

China's energy policy called for integrating energy development and conservation while giving priority to energy conservation, said Wen.

"Our goal is to build a stable, economical and clean energy supply system," he said.

China had set the target of cutting its energy consumption per unit of GDP for 2005 by 20 percent - by 2010, Wen added.

To safeguard global energy security, China had called on the international community to develop a new energy security concept featuring "mutually-beneficial cooperation, diversified development and coordinated guarantee," he said.

China would use the global energy market as necessary and strengthen cooperation with other energy producers and consumers, including the European countries, on the basis of equality and mutual benefit in a common effort to enhance global energy security, said the premier.

The Chamber of Commerce Hamburg, which initiated the summit, expected more than 350 economic, political and scientific leaders from both China and Europe to attend the event which will run until Friday.

German Federal Minister of Economics and Technology Michael Glos, Mayor of Hamburg Ole von Beust, and former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt were among the German leaders who attended the summit on Wednesday.

Wen arrived in Germany on Wednesday for a two-day visit, the third leg of his four-nation tour which took him to Finland and Britain and will also include a visit to Tajikistan.

The Chinese premier will meet German President Horst Koehler and Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin on Thursday.

Source: Xinhua