Redo draft deployment proposal for national power plan: Deputy PM

Deputy PM Tran Hong Ha has asked the Ministry of Industry and Trade to redo its deployment proposal for the national power development plan VIII (PDP VIII) towards making it more comprehensive.

He has also asked the ministry to build a piloting mechanism to let state utility Vietnam Electricity (EVN) and qualified domestic businesses conduct offshore wind power projects.

Ha noted that Vietnam is yet to have a complete legal framework on offshore wind power development, covering such details as who can grant investment certificates, what the process of selecting investors will be, power price mechanisms and the process for carrying out surveys of offshore resources.

He said the ministry should redo the draft plan as the current version does not meet the requirements of detailed deployment, administrative procedures and other aspects. It should review renewable energy projects in order to re-determine power supply and demand and the portfolio of power projects for operation by 2030, he added.

The PDP VIII mentions that Vietnam has a technical potential of generating 600,000 MW from offshore wind power. The target is to develop 6,000 MW of offshore wind power until 2030 to serve the domestic market and moving towards 70,000-91,500 MW by 2050.

Another goal is to develop offshore wind power and renewable energy of 15,000 MW by 2035 and 240,000 MW by 2050 for production of green energy, such as green hydrogen and green ammonia.

Vietnam is in a position to attract offshore wind power investments, but failures to provide timely policy support policy can turn investors and suppliers away, the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) has said in its newly-released “Global Offshore Wind Report 2023.”

The GWEC emphasizes that major wind energy developers have been facing a profitability crunch in recent years, causing them to retrench and withdraw from smaller or slower-moving markets.

One example of this is Denmark’s Orsted withdrawing from Vietnam, Vattenfall Boreas projects in the UK, and the U.S. Avangrid development.

However, the council has also stressed the advantage that Vietnam has in the oil-gas industry being able to quickly transition to offshore wind.

Petrovietnam has stated that it is currently not allowed to invest in offshore wind power projects under a Politburo resolution, although the state-owned oil and gas group is highly capable of doing so.

"Petrovietnam is capable of all offshore wind power activities, from the beginning to the ending phases. In seabed surveys, hydrogeological tasks, data analysis and research, Petrovietnam is the best in Vietnam, thanks to its experience in working in the sea over the past 60 years," its vice-chairman Pham Tien Dung said.

Petrovietnam and its subsidiaries were also capable of manufacturing equipment, he added, noting that Petrovietnam Technical Services Corp. (PTSC) has won a mega contract with Danish power giant Orsted to build equipment in Vietnam for a Taiwan-based offshore wind power project.