Excavator components are produced at Taiyuan Heavy Machinery's plant. [Photo by Wang Peipei for China Daily]

Thanks to the rapid growth of the manufacturing industry, Shanxi's industrial sectors kept a steady increase in the first quarter of this year.

Statistics show that the local industries above designated size – which refer to enterprises with annual sales revenue of more than 20 million yuan ($2.81 million) – reported an average year-on-year increase of 4.7 percent in the first three months of this year. The rate is 1.7 percentage points higher than the national average.

Driven by the strong performance of advanced manufacturers, the manufacturing industry in Shanxi registered an impressive year-on-year rise of 13.3 percent.

Shanxi has formed a number of manufacturing industry chains in areas such as railway transport equipment, steelmaking and mining machinery. Standing at the top of the chains is advanced manufacturers like CRRC Datong, Taiyuan Iron and Steel Group and Taiyuan Heavy Machinery Group.

Taiyuan Heavy Machinery is one of the fastest-growing companies among Shanxi's manufacturers.

Chen Qing, an executive of the company, said that it had secured orders worth 1 billion yuan for the single product of front-shovel-type mining excavators by May 15. He added that the full-year sales revenue of the product is expected to surpass 2.5 billion yuan.

Founded in the 1950s, Taiyuan Heavy Machinery was one of earliest homegrown heavy machinery builders in the People's Republic of China. It now has one of the most comprehensive product portfolios in the country's coal-mining machinery industry.

In recent decades, it has diversified into the new energy sector, becoming a leading player in the wind power equipment manufacturing industry in Shanxi.

"With our dominance in coal-mining machinery and wind power equipment, our company is now one of the few leading manufacturers in Shanxi in two industries," Chen said. He added that the diversification is in line with Shanxi's economic transformation move, which features upgrading traditional industries toward the directions of efficient and clean operations and fostering emerging industries as new local growth engines.

Also riding the wave of transformation is CRRC Datong, the branch company of China Railway Rolling Stock Corp in the city of Datong.

The company's new, innovative product is a locomotive driven by a storage battery.

The battery-powered locomotive made by CRRC Datong can save 109 yuan per hour in energy consumption, according to Wang Yufei, deputy general manager of the company.

He added that as the locomotive has zero emissions, it can reduce 339.95 metric tons of carbon dioxide discharge per year.

"Trains with such a locomotive can run on conventional railways, free from electricity grids," the executive said.

The company is also one of the producers of the electrified Hexie bullet train locomotive, which accounts for 35 percent of the domestic market. Over the past seven decades, the company has supplied more than 12,000 locomotives to China's railway industry.

"While meeting China's demands for environmentally friendly railway equipment, our next-stage target is to promote the products to the world," Wang said.

Taiyuan Iron and Steel Group, the leading steelmaker in Shanxi, has also devoted a great deal of energy toward developing products for China's sustainability.

Its new product offering is the special steel for the hydrogen industry. Hydrogen is a source of clean energy recently emerging in China.

In October 2021, it completed the research and development for steel used in the storage of hydrogen.

"Developed and produced to meet the requirements for the super-low-temperature and high-pressure storage of hydrogen, ours is the pacesetting product in the industry," an executive of the company said.

Taiyuan Iron and Steel is a competitive player in China's steel industry. It is among the very few manufacturers in the world that can produce broadsheet stainless steel foil with a thickness of less than 0.02 millimeters. The product is produced for applications in specific industries including aerospace, electronics, petrochemicals and automobiles.

Du Juan contributed to this story.