From Beijing Review (link):
At first glance, the official figures of China’s oil consumption in 2005 seem a bit confusing. With a robust economic growth and rising annual oil imports, China made the surprise announcement that its oil consumption growth rate was dropping sharply, from 15.3 percent in 2004 to 2.1 percent in 2005. Earlier, China’s Ministry of Commerce attributed the slower growth to high oil prices, the government’s macro-control and a relatively sufficient electric power supply, but some argue that this phenomenon is a result of tightening oil supplies rather than a decline in the demand for oil.
It is widely predicted that China’s oil demand in 2006 will see a rebound, that is, a demand growth rate of 6 percent over 2005. The Chinese Government has already announced on several occasions that it would continue to maintain the moderate increase in both oil consumption and oil imports. At the same time, China will try to reduce its reliance on oil in its economic development. For example, while low emission vehicles are being promoted, generation boilers and dynamotors consuming oil are to be eliminated, supplemented by a series of policies to encourage energy saving and the use of substitute energy.
