Giant Wind Farm Proposed Offshore Vietnam

UK offshore wind developer Enterprize Energy has revealed plans to build the 3.4GW Ke Ga offshore wind farm in Vietnam.

The project is valued at around USD 9 billion excluding the investment for the power grid connection. Enterprise Energy has reportedly signed agreements with Petroleum Equipment Assembly & Metal Structure (PVC-MS) and Vietnam-Russia Oil and Gas Joint Venture (Vietsovpetro) for the delivery of the grid connection system.

The project details were discussed during a workshop in Hanoi organised by Enterprize Energy and Vietnam Energy Association (VEA).

The wind farm will be developed in 600MW phases, Enterprize Energy said. It will feature MHI Vestas wind turbines installed some 20 kilometres offshore Ke Ga cape on a site covering around 2,000 square kilometres.

Société Générale will lead the financing of the project, with the World Bank also involved, the developer said.

”The Ke Ga offshore wind power project with a total capacity of 3,400MW, valued around US$ 9 billion excluding investment for power grid connection to national power system will be developed by some of investment phases with a capacity of 600 MW for each phase,” Ian Hatton, Enterprize Energy’s Chairman, said.

”The Binh Thuan Provincial People’s Committee (PPC) supports the project very much and has sent a paper to Government for consideration, and on June 25, 2018, Government issued the Official Letter No 6964 / VPCP-QHQT dated June 25, 2018 based on the report of Enterprize Energy.”

According to Hatton, appropriate and stable regulations from the government, a reasonable power purchase agreement, coupled with the use of proven turbine technologies from reputable contractors, will enable the international banks to ensure sufficient capital for developing the project.

The first phase of the project is expected to be operational by 2022. Current Feed-in-Tariff (FiT) for projects that enter commercial operation by November 2021 is USD 9.8 cents per kWh.

“Given this fact, it is likely that Enterprise Energy will propose that the Vietnamese government adopt a special incentive scheme for the giant project to accelerate the implementation,” the workshop heard.