BEIJING, CHINA: Energy-starved China has halted construction on 23 power stations with total capacity of nearly 32,000 megawatts because they don't have the necessary environmental approvals, the government said on Wednesday.

The projects include the 12,600-megawatt Xiluodu station on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the 4,200-megawatt underground power station at the Three Gorges Dam, the State Environmental Protection Administration said on its Web Site www.zhb.gov.cn.

"Construction of these projects has started without approval of the assessment of their environmental impact... They are typical illegal projects of construction first, approval next," Pan Yue, vice director of the administration, was quoted as saying.

Sound economic growth is driving demand for power in the world's second largest power consumer, and that demand far outstrips supply. Brownouts hit two-thirds of China's provinces last summer.

The government accelerated construction of power projects last year to cope with the worst power crunch in two decades.

By the end of 2004, China's installed power generation capacity totalled 440,700 megawatts, up 12.6 percent from the year-earlier period, the fastest annual growth in a decade.

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