StraitsTimes-June 23
The Republic on Thursday (June 23) began importing renewable energy from Laos via Thailand and Malaysia – a move that marks the first multilateral cross-border electricity trade involving four ASEAN countries and the first renewable energy import into Singapore. Up to 100 megawatts (MW) of hydropower from Laos will be brought into Singapore using existing interconnectors under the Lao PDR-Thailand-Malaysia-Singapore Power Integration Project – an intergovernmental project set up in 2014 to study the feasibility of cross-border power trade. The 100MW account for about 1.5 per cent of Singapore’s peak electricity demand in 2020 and could power around 144,000 four-room Housing Board flats for a year. The cross-border electricity flow follows an agreement inked in September last year between Keppel Electric – a wholly owned subsidiary of Keppel Infrastructure Holdings – and Electricite du Laos – the state-owned power supplier of Laos – to import renewable energy into Singapore. The two organizations have also signed an initial two-year power purchase agreement. The import will serve to test the technical and regulatory frameworks for importing electricity into Singapore, facilitating larger-scale imports from the region in the future. The power integration project is a step forward in the development of a broader ASEAN power grid, said the Energy Market Authority (EMA), the Ministry of Energy and Mines of Laos, Electricite du Laos and Keppel in a joint statement. https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/environment/singapore-begins-importing-renewable-energy-from-laos-via-thailand-malaysia?
