China: Electricity Consumption and GDP growth

Floyd Norris posts the China's year-over-year increases in its gross domestic product and electricity consumption for the first quarter of each year.

2002: Electricity up 9.4%, G.D.P. up 8%
2003: Electricity up 14.7%, G.D.P. up 10.3%
2004: Electricity up 16.7%, G.D.P. up 9.8%
2005: Electricity up 14.3%, G.D.P. up 9.9%
2006: Electricity up 13.4%, G.D.P. up 10.4%
2007: Electricity up 12.4%, G.D.P. up 11.7%
2008: Electricity up 16%, G.D.P. up 10.6%

China Q1'09 GDP was up 6.1% YoY while in the first two months of the year electricity consumption was down over 9% from last year.

This reminds me of this story of provinces overstating their GDP estimates.