The Vietnam power import venture, involving Singapore’s Sembcorp Utilities (SCU) and Việt Nam’s state-owned PetroVietnam Technical Services Corporation (PTSC), includes the laying of subsea power cables spanning around 1,000 kilometres between the two countries. Photo tuoitre.vn

HÀ NỘI — Singapore’s Energy Market Authority (EMA) on Tuesday announced that it has given tentative approval for plans to import 1.2 gigawatts (GW) of primarily wind-generated electricity from Việt Nam.

The latest conditional approval – given to power import projects preliminarily found to be technically and commercially viable – comes after similar authorisations for a 1GW import plan from Cambodia and 2GW from Indonesia earlier in the year.

The Vietnam power import venture, involving Singapore’s Sembcorp Utilities (SCU) and Việt Nam’s state-owned PetroVietnam Technical Services Corporation (PTSC), includes the laying of subsea power cables spanning around 1,000 kilometres between the two countries.

During an official visit of Vietnamese Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính to Singapore in February 2023, PTSC and SCU signed an investment cooperation agreement for energy export to Singapore from offshore renewable energy in Việt Nam.

Accordingly, PTSC and SCU will cooperate to invest in an offshore wind farm in Việt Nam with an initial capacity of about 2.3GW and export electricity directly to Singapore via a high-voltage underground cable.

Sembcorp said the Việt Nam offshore wind farm could start operating by 2033 subject to approvals and barring unforeseen events.

To achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050, the Singapore Government plans to import 30 per cent of its electricity needs by 2035 from clean energy sources as well as introduce a progressive carbon tax roadmap. — VNS