Solar power thriving as Vietnam goes green
Numerous projects to build large solar power facilities are under way in Vietnam, as the country scrambles to make up for an anticipated power shortage resulting from the recent cancellation of nuclear power plant construction projects.
Thien Tan Group by 2020 expects to spend US$2 billion to build five large solar power plants in the southern province of Ninh Thuan. A 50-megawatt solar plant will start operating this year, followed by four others generating 200 to 300MW each. The five plants will generate an estimated one gigawatt, equivalent to the total power output of a nuclear reactor.
The government had planned earlier to build two nuclear power plants with Russia and Japan in the province. Japanese nuclear power plant manufacturers and power companies aimed to win contracts, but the plan was cancelled in November 2016, with Hanoi noting the hefty upfront costs of several billion dollars per reactor.
Ninh Thuan province, which is blessed with ample sunshine and abundant idle land, is highly suitable for solar power generation. It is trying to attract solar power plants as an alternative to nuclear, with a goal of having large operators producing a total of 4.85GW of electricity by 2030.
That has encouraged TTC Group, a sugar, energy, real estate and tourism conglomerate, to tap into the solar business. By 2020, it will build 20 large solar plants in southern provinces with ample sunshine, including a 320MW facility in Tay Ninh province and a 300MW plant in Binh Thuan.
Power generation capacity will reach 1GW by 2020, when all large solar power plants start operating. The total investment in renewable energy is estimated at $1 billion, including wind power plants.
Khanh Hoa province has also invited solar power plants generating 120MW of electricity operated by Vietnam Electricity and others. They are forecast to start operating from this year.
Southern Vietnam, excluding Ho Chi Minh City, the country’s largest city, still has a lot of idle land, and it is relatively easy to secure the 50-70 hectare sites required for large solar panel arrays and related generating infrastructure. Annual energy production in southern Vietnam is expected to be 20-30% higher than that of Japan’s major cities, according to a local newspaper.
The government is trying to nurture solar power generation as the country’s main source of electrical power. Currently solar power accounts for only 0.01% of total generating capacity, but the government plans to increase the ratio to 3.3% by 2030 and 20% by 2050.
As solar panel prices are declining and the government is expected to introduce a system for buying excess solar power, solar adoption is expected to spread rapidly to households as well.
In Vietnam, mass fish die-offs in 2016 caused by toxic waste from the steel plant of Formosa Plastics, a unit of Taiwan’s Formosa Plastics Group, raised public awareness of environmental issues. This has been an added incentive for the government to demonstrate that it is serious about renewable energy, amid criticism of the country’s dependence on coal-fired thermal power plants.
Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, speaking at an investment promotion event last September, said that the country would not promote economic development at the expense of the environment. His comment symbolises a shift in the authorities’ policy of putting the economy before all other considerations not that long ago.
Last April, Hitachi Zosen of Japan completed construction of the country’s first waste incineration power plant in Hanoi. It burns 75 tonnes of waste a day and generates 1,930 kilowatts of electricity, enough for 5,000 households, using exhaust heat.
The Chiba-based waste processor Ichikawa Kankyo Engineering also produces refuse paper and plastic fuel, known as RPF, in Hanoi.
The Thai building materials company Superblock, which has been shifting into renewable energy, plans to embark on a joint venture with a Vietnamese company to start operating a total of six wind power plants generating 700MW of electricity in the southern part of the country by 2019.
Currently, Vietnam is similar to Japan in the 1970s, when the country experienced serious pollution problems. But more Vietnamese companies are now putting the environment before costs under government guidance, providing business opportunities for related industries.