Abstract: Inereasingly less energy puts forward higher requirements for energy saving and consumption reduction inthermal power plants. Reducing coal consumption of unit is the key problem to reduce the operating cost of power plantAccording to the characteristies of different operation modes and parameters of the unit, three methods were proposed todetermine the target values, which were junit design value, K-means clustering algorithm to optimize the operation testvalue and variable condition calculation, "The boiler thermal deviation caleulation model and cvclic function method wereused to analyze and calculate the consumption differenee of a 600 MW thermal power unit. T'he information platform ofthe consumption dilerenee analysis was designed and realized, which provided elfective guidance for the power plant tosave energy and reduce consumption.