HANOI, July 23 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam is likely to face an electricity shortage of 6.6 billion kilowatt-hour (kWh) in 2021 and 11.8 billion kWh in 2022, which can increase to 15 billion kWh in 2023, according to its Ministry of Industry and Trade.
The shortage is mainly attributable to the sluggish implementation of 47 power projects with a capacity of more than 200 megawatts (MW) each, local daily newspaper Vietnam News on Tuesday quoted Phuong Hoang Kim, director of the ministry's Electricity and Renewable Energy Authority, as saying.
Other contributing factors include higher demand than forecast, poor water flow to hydropower reservoirs and insufficient supplies of coal and gas for electricity production, Kim said.
In the first half of this year, electricity consumption increased 10 percent from the same period last year mainly because of prolonged hot weather.
In Vietnam, power supply sources that can be put into use between 2016 and 2030 have a total capacity of about 78,300 MW, more than 17,500 MW lower than the expected figure in the country's latest electricity development plan.
According to the Vietnam Power Group, the country's biggest electricity producer and sole distributor, Vietnam needs a total capacity of 60,000 MW by 2020, some 96,500 MW by 2025, and 129,500 MW by 2030.
To deal with the situation, Vietnam plans to increase the total output of electricity produced from renewable sources from approximately 58 billion kWh by 2015 to 101 billion kWh by 2020, and 186 billion kWh by 2030, and to import more electricity from China and Laos as a temporary solution.
