China Yangtze Power Co, operator of the world's largest hydropower project, said its profit rose 47 percent last year on increased generation and investment income.

Net income climbed to 5.32 billion yuan ($732 million), or 0.598 yuan a share, from 3.62 billion yuan a year earlier, the Beijing-based company said in a statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange today. Sales rose 26 percent to 8.7 billion yuan. The figures aren't audited.

The Three Gorges Dam started operating in 2003, boosting Yangtze Power's electricity output. The company is benefiting from surging energy demand in the world's fastest-growing major economy, which expanded 11.5 percent in the third quarter of 2007.

"The earnings are mainly boosted by rising output after water flow at the Yangtze River improved last year," Yang Ming, an analyst with Shenyin Wanguo Securities Co, said in Shanghai. Water flow through the dam improved last year after dropping to historic lows in 2006, said Yang.

Power output rose 27 percent to 34 billion kilowatt hours in the first nine months of 2007 from a year earlier, the utility said on October 11.

Increased generation helped boost last year's earnings, company spokesman Fu Zhenbang said by phone in Beijing today, declining to elaborate.

Yangtze Power's third-quarter profit almost doubled after the company received a dividend of 366 million yuan from China Construction Bank, the utility said on October 25. Investment gains will increase by a big margin in 2007 compared with 2006, Fu said.