New wind energy plants to be constructed in Binh Thuan (Vietnam)

Binh Thuan had an operational wind power plant in Tuy Phong with an electricity output of 7.5 megawatts deployed by Vietnam Renewable Energy Joint Stock Company (REVN). REVN expected to install another 15 wind turbines at its plant to increase capacity to 30 megawatts.

A recent World Bank study found Vietnam could produce more than 500 gigawatts of electricity from land-based and off-shore wind farms, 10 times the country’s expected national demand in 2020.

Total wind power resources in Binh Thuan are around 4,000 megawatts and the province has approved 12 new wind power projects totaling 1,500 megawatts.

However, many of the potential areas for developing wind power overlap with titanium reserves, causing the province to limit new wind energy projects.

To help solve this problem, the province last week established the Binh Thuan Wind Energy Association to accelerate the development of local renewable energy as an optimal solution for future energy supply. The key objectives of the new association in 2010 would be solving the location question and helping to prepare new policies and an overall plan to develop the wind energy.

The association this year will cooperate with Germany’s GTZ to continue research into technologies to exploit wind power reserves in the province.

Fuhrländer of Germany is to build a US$25m wind turbine factory in central Vietnam to supply wind energy projects in the Southeast Asian country and overseas.

The new manufacturing plant will be located in the coastal province of Binh Dinh and will represent Vietnam’s first wind turbine factory.

The factory will initially produce 1.5 MW wind turbines, before adding 2.5MW models to the production line. Fuhrländer has wind turbine plants in Germany, the US and Brazil.

The German company has teamed up with Vietnam Windpower Joint Stock Co to deliver the project. Fuhrländer supplied the five wind turbines for Vietnam’s first wind farm, located in the central province of Binh Thuan, although all the equipment for the $55 million project was sourced from Germany.

Germany is fostering relations with Vietnam in hopes of developing partnerships for wind power projects in the country. The state-backed development agency German Organisation for Technical Cooperation provided a $1.4m grant to Vietnam aimed at developing the nation’s wind power industry.

It is found that Vietnam has a good potential for wind energy. About 31,000 km2 of land area can be available for wind energy development in which 865 km2 equivalents to a wind power of 3,572 MW has a generation cost less than 6 US cents/kWh. 

In Vietnam, the main barrier is the lack of political impetus and a proper framework for promoting renewable energy. The priority task therefore is to set a target for renewable energy development and to find instruments to achieve such a target. The main instruments proposed here are setting feed-in tariff and providing investment incentives.

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