National energy master plan is necessary (20/5)
20/05/2013 - 11 Lượt xem
Impractical planning
Chairman
of the Vietnam Energy Association (VEA) Tran Viet Ngai said at the
Energy and Oil & Gas: Investment and Sustainable Development Forum
held by VEA and the Ministry of Industry and Trade that a national
energy master plan was necessary to solve the difficulties in the
implementation of national energy strategy.
According
to Tran Viet Ngai, Vietnam has had seven development plans for power,
five for coal, three for gas, and one for renewable energies. However,
due to a lack of a national energy master plan, all above mentioned
plans have been deployed ineffectively. In addition, all these sectoral
plans will last in about five years, which is fairly a short term, while
a common sectoral plan should take from 10 to 15 years, with a vision
of 20-30 years onward.
Planning difficulties
According
to Dr. Tran Hong Nguyen from the Electric Power University, coal prices
and power prices do not reflect the relations between input material
and output product. In fact, coal often sold to power plants at lower
prices than it really cost, which cause difficulties for coal industry.
Meanwhile, for various reasons, the power sector still faces losses on
annual basis.
“Most
of power development projects under the power plan 7 have turned out to
be behind schedule and unable to go into operation during the period
2011-2025,” Tran Viet Ngai said.
Over
the past 15 years, coal industry has experienced annually increased
cost of production from 4-5 percent on account of increased charges and
fees including environmental charge. So it is hard to meet the demand
for coal by 2016 of 55-58 million tonnes.
“Many
objectives are often included in every devised plan; however, there is a
lack of solution package for the plan. For example, some projects made
under an approved plan find it hard to get investors,” Tran Viet Ngai
said.
Government direction is needed
According
to experts, impractical plans were due to a funding lack, i.e. the
earlier funded industry may deploy its plans earlier than others. To
write off the issue, VEA requests the government to rapidly adjust and
complete the national master plan for energy development during the
2011-2020 period, with a vision toward 2030, as part of the national
energy development strategy.
The
power plan 7 should be revised in terms of socioeconomic efficiency and
demand, especially for the 2013-2015 period, with a vision toward 2030
and even 2050. In addition, renewable energy development incentive and
support mechanisms should be offered so as to attract investors into
this sector, and the Renewable Energy Law should be rapidly and
carefully prepared and submitted to the General Assembly for approval./.
Source: VEN.
Source: VEN.
