The Seminar was co-organized by the British Embassy in Vietnam, the Department of International Trade (DIT), the Energy Industry Council (EIC), the British Business Group in Vietnam (BBGV) and the Vietnam Energy Association (VEA).
The British Ambassador to Vietnam, Mr. Gareth Ward, said that Vietnam had emerged as an important energy producer in Southeast Asia in recent years. At the same time, the demand for renewable energy development in Vietnam has been rising and the Government is taking initiatives to promote this sector, especially wind and solar power.
Meanwhile, the UK is the world’s leader in offshore wind energy with the world’s largest offshore wind capacity of 7.6GW. This Seminar will lay a foundation for the UK’s close collaboration with Vietnam and the UK’s supports for Vietnam in the transition from fossil fuels and raising the proportion of renewable energy in the generation mix in years to come.
At the Seminar, representatives of 30 British companies in the area of renewable energy and green finance attended and shared policy approaches, legal framework formulation and experiences on low carbon energy development.
Speaking at the Seminar, Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Cao Quoc Hung said that in the past 20 years, Vietnam has achieved an impressive gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 6 – 7%. On the other hand, the electricity demand has increased by more than 13% in the period 2000 - 2010; over 11% in the period 2011 - 2016; and around10% in 2018. The constant increase in power demand has created great pressure on investment in power generation facilities, as well as transmission and distribution systems.
Forecasts show that Vietnam's economy will keep on growing at a high rate of 6.5 - 7.5% per year from now until 2030, therefore satisfying energy demand must be prioritized.
One of Vietnam's priority objectives is to develop renewable energy and reduce its dependence on conventional generation types with the aim of protecting the environment.
According to the National Power Development Plan approved by the Prime Minister, the installed capacity of the country will reach 130,000MW by 2030. As such, about 83,000MW of new capacity will need to be developed and put into operation from now until 2030, along with associated transmission and distribution infrastructures.
The renewable energy development strategy until 2030, with vision to 2050, approved by the Government of Vietnam in September 2015 has set specific targets. In particular, the proportion of electricity output from renewable energy sources in the total electricity generation output nationwide will increase from 35% in 2015 to 38% in 2020 and 43% in 2050.
In order to motivate the development of renewable energy to achieve these development targets, the Ministry of Industry and Trade has developed and submitted to the Government for approval and promulgation a series of incentive mechanisms such as FIT (feed-in tariff) for solar power, wind power, waste-to-energy, biomass energy, etc. The Government has issued other preferential policies for investors such as prioritizing credit provision, reduction or exemption of corporate income tax, land lease fee, adoption of standard power purchase agreement, etc.
Through the Seminar, the Ministry of Industry and Trade wished to exchange and obtain the UK’s and international experiences in low carbon energy and renewable energy development; exchanging solutions, cooperation opportunities, possibilities of accessing financial resources from international and British financial institutions for renewable energy projects in Vietnam.