Chinese city dims lights in heatwave power shortage

The provincial capital in southwest China has dimmed outdoor advertisements, subway lighting and building signs to save energy, official announcements said, as the area battles a power crunch triggered by record-high temperatures.

The mercury has soared beyond 40 degrees Celsius in Sichuan Province this week, fueling massive demand for air-conditioning and drying up reservoirs in a region reliant on dams for most of its electricity.

"Hot and muggy weather has caused the city's electricity supply for production and daily life to be pushed to its limit," Chengdu's urban management authorities said in a notice on social media on Thursday.

Faced with a "most severe situation," the city – home to over 20 million people – ordered landscape illumination and outdoor advertising lights to be switched off in notices issued on Tuesday, the statement said.

Building name signs will also be darkened.

And Chengdu Metro said in a video on China's Twitter-like Weibo platform that it would also turn off advertisement lights and "optimize" the temperature in stations to save energy.

The searing heat is also drying up the critical Yangtze River, with water flow on its main trunk about 51 percent lower than the average over the last five years, state media outlet China News Service reported on Thursday.

Meanwhile, weather authorities in the eastern Jiangsu Province warned drivers of tire puncture risks on Friday as the surface temperature of some roads was poised to hit 68 degrees Celsius.

The China Meteorological Administration earlier said the country was going through its longest period of sustained high temperatures since records began in 1961.