A central China city cut off its heating supply from Jan 5 as the temperatures dropped to -10C during a cold spell recently, the Beijing News reported on Wednesday.

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Staffers at the Mayor’s Hotline in Linzhou, Henan province said on Jan 11 that due to problems with heating sources, the city would not recover heating supply this winter and residents would receive a full refund of heating expenses. While local media reported that in order to meet emission reduction targets, a power plant was ordered to shut down, which led to local heat companies having to stop their services.

As large an area as 200,000 square meters of the city has been affected by the heat cut. Some major schools and hospitals started their own boilers to keep warm.

According to an urgent notice issued by the National Development and Reform Commission on September 2010, the goal of energy conservation and emission reduction should not be met at the expense of public interests, let alone restricting the electricity and heating consumption of local residents.

Building an energy-saving and eco-friendly society is a major target of the 11th Five-Year Plan – a guideline for China's economic development from 2006 to 2010.