China's National Development and Reform Commission has commissioned China Shenhua Energy Co., the nation's largest coal producer, to build 10 storage facilities for coal across the country, reported Tuesday's China Daily.

The newspaper said, citing a senior company executive, that the company is still picking sites for the facilities. He did not elaborate on the specific candidate sites of the 10 coal reserve bases or their reserve capacity.

Shenhua's 10 coal storage facilities will be built next to China's major power producing regions. Coal reserve is divided into spot and resource reserves, and Shenhua's responsibility is to build spot reserves, said the newspaper, citing Hao Gui, vice-president of China Shenhua Energy Co.

As the world's biggest producer and consumer of coal, 70 percent of China's power supply comes from coal-fired power plants.

Since August 2008, the Chinese government has started revising coal legislation to include a strategic coal reserve by 2015.

Currently, there are no national strategic coal reserves in the country and only some enterprises keep a certain quantity of coal in stock.

It has been reported that Zhejiang and Shandong, the two major coal-consuming provinces, have already started building pilot coal reserve bases.