Energy in Vietnam
The country has recently been successful in renewable energy deployment, especially solar and wind power development.
[14] Mr. Sabyasachi Mishra, mineral sales manager at Tata International, predicts that Vietnam's annual coal imports will increase from 20 million tons to 30 million tons in the next one or several years, especially when domestic coal reserves are downward trend.
In addition, the increase in reserves is so low that from 2018 to 2025, oil production will decrease steadily every year by 10% – equivalent to more than 2 million tons.
Lack of capital is the main reason that PVN has not been able to boost oil and gas exploration activities in the past years to increase reserves.
The increased output to compensate for the exploitation has reduced to a worrying level, affecting the sustainable development of Vietnam's oil and gas industry.
[21] According to the 2018 report of the MOIT, production of natural gas has increased gradually from 2011 to 2016, but has decreased slightly in 2017 when only reached 9.8 billion m3.
[24] At the end of 2018, hydropower was the largest source of renewable energy, contributing about 40% to the total national electricity capacity.
[25] In 2020, wind and solar had a combined share of 10% of the country's electrical generation, already meeting the government's 2030 goal, suggesting future displacement of growth of coal capacity.
The commercial biomass electricity generation is currently slow and limited to valorizing bagasse only, but the stream of forest products, agricultural and municipal waste is increasing.
[27] This represents an annualized installation rate of about 90 W per capita per annum, placing Vietnam among world leaders.
[33] This offers huge opportunities for meeting domestic demand as well as exporting other countries such as Singapore.
According to theoretical calculations, the total hydro-power capacity of the country is about 35,000 MW, of which 60% is concentrated in the North, 27% is distributed in the Central and 13% in the South.
However, compared to 2015 data, the industrial sector had the highest share, correctively 43% and the residential section had a reduction to 27% of energy demand.
For the final energy consumption classified by type of fuel, the amount of electricity consumed increases significantly from 2006 to 2015.
This reflects the high level of energy use associated with Vietnam's industrialization and its heavy reliance on coal.
In particular, fuel combustion activities are common in the electricity production, industry and construction, transportation, agriculture / forestry / fisheries and a number of other sectors.
[42] Other measures include carbon pricing, which was legalized in the form of emission trading scheme in the Law on Environmental Protection 2020.
