About 6,000 poor ethnic households in remote areas of the northern provinces of Dien Bien, Lai Chau and Son La have been connected to the power grid in time for Tet, according to Electricity of Vietnam.
The 351 households resettled due to the construction of the Thac Ba Reservoir in Thac Ba Hydro-electricity Plant in northern Yen Bai Province also gained access to power.
As of last year, over 96 per cent of the country had access to the national electricity grid, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, which supervises the electricity sector in Vietnam.
However, 126 communes across the country still lack power, most of them in remote areas.
Since 2002, 29 medium and large hydro-electricity plants have gone into operation, causing over 38,500 households to be resettled. In many cases, these people still lack power; moreover, they are struggling to earn a living in their new homes due to poor infrastructure and shortage of land for cultivation.
At a meeting with the National Assembly’s Ethnics Council last month, minister Vu Huy Hoang said that improving power supply to remote areas was a major priority for the power sector this year.
......................................................................................
French group to help finance high-voltage line
The French Development Agency yesterday agreed to help with a loan of 75 million euros (US$101.8 million) to build the Pleiku-Cau Bong high-voltage power line.
The loan is being financed jointly by the Asian Development Bank.
The 437km high voltage (500kV) line will connect Pleiku City in the Central Highland province of Gia Lai with Cau Bong District in the southern Binh Phuoc Province from 2015.
The Central region has significant capacity to generate power while in the South demand is increasing. Power transmitted from the Centre to the South is to increase from 2500MW to 5300MW, reducing the need to use coal and imported gas.
The project will also be used to import electricity from hydropower plants in Laos and Cambodia, to come on line in 2018.
Since 2000, the French agency has committed 210 million euros ($285 million) to support the production, transmission and supply of electricity in Viet Nam through the financing of a hydropower plant at Huoi Quang, high-voltage lines in northern Viet Nam and the rural electrification in the Mekong Delta.
Approximately 110,000 households enjoy the benefits of these projects.
Source: VNS