Driving away the challenges in coal thermal power development

The adverse impact on the environment is a major challenge for the development of coal thermal plants. Picture: collected.

Keeping main role by 2030

Currently, the power sources involved in the national power system include: hydroelectricity, coal thermal power, gas fired power generation, renewable energy (wind power, solar power, small hydropower, biomass).

A representative of Vietnam Coal and Mineral Industries Group (Vinacomin) said that the coal thermal power plants with the scale of 25,620MW, accounting for 42.7% of the capacity, would supply 130.2 billion kWh, accounting for 49.3 % of total system power by 2020. By 2030, coal thermal power with total capacity of 53,890MW, accounting for 42.6% of total capacity would supply 304.3 billion kWh, accounting for 53.2% of the system power. The coal thermal power capacity in 2030 compared to 2020 is basically unchanged at 42.7% (2020) compared to 42.6% (2030), but the power supply would increase by 10.6%. Based on the analysis of the proportion of electricity sources in the Power Plan VII, it is possible to confirm that the coal thermal power plants would still play a major role in ensuring the supply of electricity to the National grid system now and in the future.

Although confirming the important role in supplying the electricity, the actual development of coal thermal power plants has been facing many difficulties and challenges, typically the environmental problem. Vinacomin stated that the coal thermal power plants were considered as a main cause of environmental pollution which affected the lives of people living around the plants. This was one of the reasons that choosing the location of coal thermal power plants became increasingly difficult due to the lack of support from the local people in the planned places for building the plants.

In relation to this, Mr. Le Van Luc, Deputy Head of the Electricity and Renewable Energy Bureau (the Ministry of Industry and Trade, assessed that the environmental protection should be paid attention by the Government and ministries, branches. “Do the coal thermal power plants pollute? If it was not treated and solved, it would have caused pollution. When preparing projects, the environmental impact assessment reports and the solutions for handling ash, gas, liquid… must be made and to comply with the approved environmental standards. During the implementation of construction investment and operation, the investors must always comply with the current regulations. We have the solution, master the technology, treat them, they will not harm the environment, people, and creatures. If you think that the emission is dangerous, it will be “extreme” for electricity,” Mr.Luc said.

Selecting in project approval

In addition to the environmental issues, the Vinacomin representative informed that the coal thermal power plants with high capacity were facing many difficulties in arranging the investment capital, especially since the Government advocated not to grant the loan guarantee for the electricity projects. In addition, according to the Government's regulations, the investment in the ash yards of coal thermal power plants had a maximum capacity of 2 years. Therefore, the treatment and elimination of ash, slag, gypsum was a very big challenge for the coal thermal power projects… Vinacomin proposed that the Government should have a guarantee policy for the foreign preferential loans for the large-scale coal thermal power plants to deploy these projects efficiently and feasibly; Improve and guide the application of standards and regulations for the use of ash, slag, gypsum emitted by the coal thermal power plants as well as calculating costs on electricity prices.

Around the story of coal thermal power generation, Assoc. Dr. Tran Dinh Thien, Director of the Vietnam Institute of Economics, said that in spite of the efforts in the power structure, from now to 2030, Vietnam still had to use coal powered electricity generation for about 40% of supply needs because there were no alternative sources.The solution on solving the consequences of coal power was to focus on changing technology and the management method. “Increasing coal power is inevitable in the future, but Vietnam must make efforts to increase the coal power slowly and reduce it gradually,” Dr. Tran Dinh Thien emphasized.

To further contribute to the development of coal thermal power, Mr. Le Van Luc said that in Vietnam, for coal-fired thermal power plants, many factories were operating normally in the city now, particularly, the thermal power plants in Uong Bi city (Quang Ninh), Cao Ngan (Thai Nguyen). The issue of environmental protection and emission treatment must comply with the current regulations on environmental protection. If the plants are planned and invest in the landscape, they would be no different than parks or resorts. In the coming time, the approval of investment projects must be very selective. From plant technology to technology solutions, environmental treatment equipment for ash, exhaust fumes and waste water must be checked, supervised (online) strictly. If we manage and select the appropriate technology, the environmental issue would not be worrying. Especially now, the legal provisions on construction investment, environmental protection has been promulgated fully, technology is modern and investors' consciousness is also much more aware,” Mr. Luc said.