The electricity sector in 2017 will strive to prevent the power tariff from stirring controversy, said Hoang Quoc Vuong, deputy minister of Industry and Trade.

Vuong said the sector has not seen complaints about power tariffs this year, as the prices have been kept stable. The sector has ensured power supply to the production and consumption demand as well as national energy security in the year of 2016.

A report from the Electricity of Viet Nam (EVN) showed that in 2016, the group planned to have power output of 175.9 billion kWh. Of which, the EVN’s power productivity would be 81.6 billion kWh, while that of purchasing power output was 94.27 billion kWh and the commercial power output was 19.1 billion kWh.

As of October, total power capacity was 40,823 MW, including 15,368 MW of hydropower plants; 13,826 MW from thermal power plants; 2,209 MW from small hydropower plants and 395MW from imported power.

The National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) – one of the two big groups providing fuel to thermal power plants said its gas supply next year was expected to be lower than this year’s. Therefore, PetroVietnam will continue to work with its members to adjust the gas supplies in 2017 to meet with power production demand.

Nguyen Van Bien, deputy general director of Viet Nam National Coal and Minerals Group (Vinacomin), said the group and Dong Bac Corporation have been studying to design three new vessels to better serve coal transportation. Vinacomin has also worked with three transport companies to facilitate coal transport to thermal power plants.

This year, Vinacomin supplied around 4.8 million tonnes of coal to EVN thermal power plants. The amount is expected to reach 5 million tonnes in 2017.

Deputy minister Vuong asked all power companies to pay attention to power plant maintenance to ensure safety, as there were some incidents this year.

He required PetroVietnam to ensure gas supplies for electricity production while asking Vinacomin and Dong Bac Corporation to supply coal for 22 power plants.

In addition, Viet Nam will consider importing power from Laos if the tariff was lower than local production costs. — VNS