An operational wind power plant in Quang Tri province. (Photo: VNA) Lao investors will offer to sell over 682 MW of wind powerbefore 2025 while the remaining amount will be delivered after thisperiod, the MoIT said in its recent report.
Wind power imported from Laos will be brought to Vietnam via transmissionlines in the central province of Quang Tri. That means the amount ofelectricity purchased will depend largely on the infrastructure in this area.
However, the wind power that Lao investors want to sell to Vietnam will exceed thecapacity of the provincial power grid as most 200 kV and 110 kV lines inthe locality regularly operate between 80% and 100% of thedesigned capacity. Particularly in the dry season from Mayto July, the province can only receive a maximum of 300 MW of electricitywhile the remaining months of the year can receive a lower level.
According to EVN, with the additional grid infrastructure and connectionlines and the operation of the 500 kV Huong Hoa substation, the province couldonly receive 2,500 MW of electricity from Laos. But this figure wouldbe 1,650 MW lower than the total capacity that Lao investors wanted tosell to Vietnam.
Previously last year, EVN submitted a document to the MoIT regardingthe proposal to import wind power from Laos to Quang Tri province.
EVNurged the ministry to review and submit to the Prime Minister the proposal to importelectricity from the Truong Son Wind Power Plant, including additionalplanning for transmission lines. The purchase price for electricity from thisproject would be 6.95 US cents/kWh.
Theministry said it had received a document requesting feedback from ministriesand localities on the proposal to purchase wind power from the plant, with acapacity of 250MW, from Bolikhamsai province in Laos to Vietnam, as proposed byEVN.
Accordingto the ministry, the plant would be slated for completion in the fourthquarter of 2025.
To meet the project completion schedule in 2025, the project's investor, the VietnamLaos Energy Investment and Development Corporation, sent a documentto EVN proposing to sell electricity from this project to Việt Nam.The investor suggested investing in the entire grid connection project toconnect the plant to Vietnam’s power system using the project's funds.
In an earlier development, in a report to the ministry, EVN stated that thegovernments of Laos and Vietnam had agreed to import 1,000MW of electricityfrom Laos to Vietnam by 2020.
The imported electricity volume was expected to be around 3,000MW by 2025and about 5,000MW by 2030. As of October 2023, the Prime Ministerhad approved the proposal to import electricity from various sources inLaos with a total capacity of 2,689MW.
EVN had signed 19 power purchase agreements (PPA) to buy electricity from26 Laotian power plants with a total capacity of 2,240MW. Among them, sevenprojects were commercially operational with a total capacity of 806MW, andit was expected that an additional 1,171MW could be put into operation by2025, according to the ministry./.
VNA
