The State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC), being an institutional unit affiliated under the State Council, was formally established and started to perform functions since March 20, 2003. In the meantime, the Office of State Power Institutional Reform was transferred from the former State Development Planning Commission to SERC, and the latter has taken over the responsibility for the routine of power institutional reform.

Along with the establishment of North China Grid Company Ltd. on November 8, 2003, five regional grid companies affiliated to the State Grid Corporation had all been organized, which included North China, Northeast China, East China, Central China and Northwest China. The main responsibilities of the regional grid companies are to operate and manage power grid in respective region and power sources kept by the grid companies for peak and frequency regulation and emergency power reserves, to ensure power security, to make grid development planning in the region, to cultivate regional power market, to optimize regional power resources disposition, to manage regional power dispatching and trade center, and to dispatch regional power grid as a whole. In 2003, about five hundred power plants affiliated to the former State Power Corporation were assigned respectively to relevant power generation groups. With the separation of power plants from power grids basically completed, it had laid a sound foundation for further deepening the reform of bidding for access to grid.

The successful separation of the central power enterprise’s main business from side business had opened good prospects of further transformation of power operational mechanism. The North China Electric Power University originally affiliated to the former State Power Corporation had been transferred to the Ministry of Education and jointly financially supported by the newly established two large power grid corporations and five power generation groups.