Cong Ly starts operation of 99MW wind power plant in Bac Lieu

photo source enternews.vn

The plant, the construction of which started in 2010, has an area of 1,300 hectares and a total investment capital of VND5.2 trillion ($233 million).

Since the first wind turbine was connected to the national grid in May 2013. The plant has produced 130 million KWh, earning a revenue of VND150 billion ($6.7 million) and paying VND15 billion ($672,000) as tax.

To Hoai Dan, CEO of Cong Ly, said that the company plans to soon implement the next phase, building 71 wind turbines of 2MW each for VND8.850 trillion ($397 million). The construction is scheduled to be carried out in 36 months and operation is going to start in 2018.

“This is going to be the biggest wind farm in the Mekong Delta area,” Dan was quoted to say by newswire enternews.vn.

On January 16, Cong Ly started the construction of phase I of Khai Long-Ca Mau tourism zone wind power plant in the southernmost province of Ca Mau.

The 100 MW plant, to be built on a total of 2,165 hectares of land and sea surface area, is scheduled for completion in 2018. It will be connected to the national grid and also sell its power to EVN. The plant’s total investment value is about VND6.5 trillion ($291.5 million).

The prime minister is going to set the price at which the plant is going to sell its generated power to EVN, taking into consideration the investment into the project. The price is not going to exceed that of similar projects built near the shore. Vietnam Development Bank is going to lend to the project.

According to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, a total of 50 wind power projects have been registered but only 5 saw implementation. 3 of these, namely Tuy Phong in Binh Thuan, with a capacity of 30 MW, a 6 MW wind power project on Phu Quy Island in Binh Thuan, and the 99 MW Bac Lieu plant, are generating commercially.

Of these three, only Cong Ly sells electricity at 9.8 US cent/kWh, because its wind mills are on the sea. The other two, as per Decision 37/2011/QD-TTg on mechanism to support the development of wind power projects, sells for 7.8 US cent/kWh, of which 6.8 US cent is paid by Vietnam Electricity (EVN) and 1 cent is paid by Vietnam Environment Protection Fund.

The 7.8 US cent/kWh price is higher than the retail price of power sold to consumers, but wind power developers are still incurring huge losses.

Vietnam is going to increase the use of renewable energy from now to 2030, according to a national renewable energy strategy for 2030 with a vision to 2050 approved last November by the prime minister. Accordingly, from now to 2030, the government is going to prioritise developing wind power on land. Near-shore and offshore wind power development will be focused on after 2030. The percentage of power produced from wind is going to rise from 180 million kWh in 2015 to 2.5 billion kWh in 2020, 16 billion in 2030, and 53 billion in 2050.