Vietnam to increase wind power capacity

The Vietnamese government has aimed to raise total capacity of wind power to 800 megawatts (MW) by the end of 2020, some 2,000 MW by 2025 and 6,000 MW by 2030, Vietnam News Agency reported on Tuesday.

At a wind power workshop in Vietnam’s capital Hanoi on Tuesday, Vietnamese participants said that by the end of 2018, the total capacity of wind power turbines installed in the country was only 228 MW.

With huge potential for wind power development, Vietnam will be an attractive investment destination if it has a stable and long-term legal framework, said foreign participants.

The foreign participants said Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, boasts great potential as wind speeds here average 6.5-7.5 meters per second, and wind turbine towers with the height of 120 meters can operate in this condition.

According to them, Vietnam’s feed-in tariff (FIT) scheme, the selling prices of electricity from renewable energy sources sold to the grid or used on the spot, is also very good, 8.5 U.S. cents per kWh for onshore wind power projects and 9.8 U.S. cents per kWh for offshore projects, not to mention other incentives like exemption of equipment import tariffs and corporate income taxes.

According to the Vietnam Power Group (EVN), the country’s biggest electricity producer and sole distributor, hydropower and coal-fired power are leading among electricity generation sources. To meet the growing demand for electricity, Vietnam needs to increase its total capacity from 47,900 MW by the end of September 2018 to 60,000 MW by 2020, to 96,500 MW by 2025, and to 129,500 MW by 2030.