China's top five power groups reported a surge in net profits last year, attributed mainly to lower generating cost resulting from persistently falling coal prices. 

The five groups, including Huaneng, Guodian, Huadian, Datang and China Power Investment, posted a combined net profit of 47.39 billion yuan ($7.78 billion) in 2013, state media Xinhua reported.

These companies realized a combined profit of 74.03 billion yuan in 2013, surging 85.09% from 40 billion yuan in 2012.

Huaneng, the nation’s top generator, realized net profit of 12.79 billion yuan and total profit of 20.84 billion yuan in 2013, followed by Guodian with net profit of 10.34 billion yuan and total profit of 15.79 billion yuan.

Meanwhile, Huadian, Datang and China Power Investment reported net profit of 9.67 billion, 7.43 billion and 7.15 billion yuan, and total profit of 15.17 billion, 11.07 billion and 11.16 billion yuan, respectively.

China’s coal prices stayed low in 2013 amid high coal inventory and slowing coal consumption. At Qinhuangdao, the FOB price of domestic 5,500 Kcal/kg NAR coal dropped to as low as 511 yuan/t with VAT in late September, according to the Fenwei/Platts CCI1 index.

The total power generating capacity of the five groups reached 584 GW as of the end of 2013, accounting for 47% of the nation's total, according to data from these companies.

Huaneng ranked first with 142 GW of generating capacity, of which thermal capacity stood at 113.56 GW, followed by Guodian with total capacity of 123 GW and thermal capacity of 92.27 GW.

Meanwhile, China Power Investment said that its solar power generation capacity increased 328% and totalled 2.5 GW as of the end of 2013, which made it the world's top solar power producer.