In the past 10 years, renewable energy has been one of the main development drivers, making Ninh Thuan the fastest growing economic region in the Central region and leading in the country. From struggling to find a way to escape the drought, this locality is increasingly taking full advantage of its natural advantages to become a renewable energy center of the country.
Making economy from sun and wind
No other locality in Vietnam has many favorable natural conditions for renewable energy like Ninh Thuan. This is the province with the highest wind speed in the country, an average of 7.5m/s at an altitude of 65m and a wind density of 400-500W/m2 or more; During the year, there is a time when the maximum wind speed is about 18-20m/s (at an altitude of 12m). Ninh Thuan is less affected by storms and the wind blows evenly for 10 months with a speed of 6.4-9.6m/s, so it ensures stable operation of wind turbines.
Regarding the conditions for solar power development, because it is located in the southernmost region of Central Vietnam, the terrain is parallel to the wind direction, so the rainfall here is always the lowest in the country. In return, Ninh Thuan has an average number of sunny hours a year up to 2600-2800 hours, equivalent to about 200 sunny days/year. The uniform lighting time creates conditions for the energy cells to receive solar radiation up to over 230 kcal/cm2, the highest in the country.
Panorama of Phuoc Huu solar power plant with scale of 184 MW in Ninh Phuoc district, Ninh Thuan province.
Taking advantage of that special advantage, at present, Ninh Thuan has 32 solar power projects and 3 wind power projects put into commercial operation, reaching a scale of 2437.55 MW. In addition, 375 MW of rooftop solar power was installed to serve on-site production for businesses and household needs.
In 2020, large renewable energy projects contributed 6.3 billion kWh to the total electricity output of the country, earning more than VND 3600 billion for the Ninh Thuan province budget (about 6.84% of the province's GRDP). , and at the same time create more than 17,000 jobs for the locality.
Renewable energy development also improves land use efficiency, especially in areas that are barren and unsuitable for agriculture. Mr. Phan Tan Canh, Vice Chairman of Ninh Thuan Provincial People's Committee, said that each year a hectare of agricultural land only brings a profit of about 10 million VND, but if used to produce solar power, the annual profit can be reached 3.84 billion VND.
Once struggling to find a way out of the drought, Ninh Thuan now considers the sun and wind as an inexhaustible resource behind the province's economic development.
The rapidly growing renewable energy industry also paved the way for the development of many other economic sectors such as real estate, construction, commerce, logistics, transportation, etc.
Along with agriculture and tourism, renewable energy is considered the main driving force to bring Ninh Thuan into the top five fastest growing localities in the past 5 years. In the first 6 months of 2021 alone, the province's GRDP increased by 14.57%, ranking second in the country. In which, the effective operation of renewable energy projects helped the industry to lead the economic sectors with an increase of 53.57%.
Great construction site in arid region
The success of Ninh Thuan has an important contribution from the right development orientation and red carpet mechanisms for investors.
In 2018, the Government issued Resolution No. 115/NQ-CP orienting Ninh Thuan to become a renewable energy center of the country. To achieve the above goal, the Resolution directs a number of areas that are not yet eligible for titanium ore mining to be included in the national reserve area to deploy wind and solar power projects. In addition, the Government has approved for the province to enjoy a preferential electricity price policy until the end of 2020 with solar power projects and connection infrastructure with a designed capacity of 2000MW. This is the plus point of Ninh Thuan in the eyes of renewable energy investors, in addition to the general incentives on land rent; taxes and fees; access to capital;...
By the end of 2021, after 3 years of implementing Resolution 115, Ninh Thuan has approved the investment policy for a total of 53 wind power, solar power and hydrogen energy projects with a total scale of 3176.5 MW.
Phuoc Huu No. 5 wind power plant of Nam Trung Group has 11 turbines with a maximum capacity of 50 MW
Regarding solar power, there are big projects such as 5 Tianjin solar farms of Tianjin Group, with a total scale of 406 MW; Phuoc Huu 2 project with a capacity of 184MW of Nha Trang Bay Construction Investment Joint Stock Company; Trung Nam 204 MW solar power plant of Trung Nam Group…
Regarding wind power, Ninh Thuan has a 37.6 MW Mui Dinh factory of Germany's EAB group; Phuoc Huu Duyen Hai 1 factory of Trung Nam Group; 2 projects Dam Nai 3 and 4, with a scale of 67MW of TSV (USA) and Blue Circle,...
Besides the names mentioned above, a series of projects in Ninh Thuan also have partnerships with many big "names" operating in many roles such as component supplier, contractor, design consultant, consultant. monitoring. Includes: Enercon (Germany); Siemens Gamesa (Europe); VSL (Australia); JA Solar (China)...
View of the wind power and solar power project Adani Phuoc Minh in Phuoc Minh commune, Thuan Nam district, Ninh Thuan province
At the end of 2021, Adani Group from India is the latest name to invest in the renewable energy field in Ninh Thuan through RT Energy Vietnam Joint Stock Company. In India, Adani is a big name with multi-field experience. This group owns Mundra seaport in Gujarat state, which is one of the three ports with the largest cargo volume in India, and owns a 74% stake in the airport of the Mumbai Financial Center, one of the two. India's busiest airline. This is also the Group that owns many important infrastructure, energy and real estate projects of this country. The Group is present in more than 70 countries and territories around the world with annual revenue of over 15 billion USD.
Adani Phuoc Minh wind power (27.2 MW) and Adani Phuoc Minh solar power (50 MW) are the first two projects that Adani Group invests in Vietnam with a total capital of 2150 billion VND. During the implementation process, RT Energy has cooperated with many other enterprises such as GE Power (USA), Henste engineering (Singapore), JA Solar (China), Rina (headquartered in Genoa, Italy), .. .
Two projects of Adani are expected to generate revenue of 365 billion VND per year, contributing more than 70 billion VND to the budget of Ninh Thuan province.
After initial successes, Mr. Ta Anh Tuan, General Director of RT Energy expressed his desire to contribute more to the development of Ninh Thuan with modern energy projects. In the future, the group intends to focus on expanding its renewable energy portfolio, such as offshore wind power, green hydrogen production and high-tech-based energy storage solutions.
In the trend of the coming decades, when traditional energy sources are gradually exhausted, Ninh Thuan's abundant sunshine and wind resources will be a precious capital for the country's electricity industry. With that advantage, together with the right strategic development orientation, renewable energy will play an increasingly important role in helping the local economy rise./.
