Page 10 - AsiaElec Week 03

AsiaElec
NEWS IN BRIEF
AsiaElec
world’s two largest economies signed this week, China has committed to buying an additional $52.4bn of US energy supplies, including LNG, over the next two years.
But a 25% tariff imposed by China on
US LNG, which has pushed the price of U.S. gas above the spot market and restricted purchases, remains for now while Washington and Beijing negotiate a Phase 2 trade deal.
“For China to massively increase imports of ... LNG from the U.S. while tariffs remain in place is going to be challenging,” said Gavin Thompson, Wood Mackenzie’s Asia Pacific vice chair.
China’s demand for LNG over and above existing contracts is expected to be about 15- 25mn tonnes per year over the next two years, according to analysts.
If China covered all of this demand
with US LNG despite the tariffs, that would increase Beijing’s purchases of US energy by about $11-12bn, or only 20% of the two-year target in the Phase 1 deal, analysts said.
“We expect the Chinese government to remove, reduce, or approve tariff exemption before incremental LNG imports from the U.S. can be meaningful,” said Jenny Yang, director of IHS Markit’s greater China Gas, Power, and Energy Future division.
If China were to buy far more US LNG, importers would have to absorb the cost of the tariffs or pass it on to consumers, which could make Chinese state oil companies reluctant
to commit to large-scale purchases, Wood Mackenzie’s Thompson said.
Even if tariffs were removed, US LNG would still be $1.50-2.50 per mmBtu more expensive than gas available in Asia, analysts and traders said, referring to Asian spot prices which are at seasonal lows.
SUPPLY
India’s power supply deficit remains unchanged at 0.5%
India’s power supply deficit stood at 0.5%
for the nine months between April 2019 and December 2019, while India’s peak power deficit stood at 0.7%, according to the data published by the Central Electricity Authority (CEA).
During the same period last year, India recorded a power supply deficit of 0.6%.
Like last year, this year also, the northeastern region recorded the highest power supply deficit of 4.1% followed by the northern region with 1.4%.
The northern region recorded a peak power deficit of 694MW, the western region recorded 20MW, the southern region recorded a peak power deficit of 115MW, the eastern region recorded 22MW, and the northeastern region recorded a peak power deficit of 111MW.
As far as the actual power generation
is concerned, all the regions saw a positive growth except for the northern and southern regions, which saw a deficit of -0.08% and -2.95%.
The actual power generation during the nine months from April to December 2019 for the financial year 2019-20 saw a growth of 0.05%
In the northern region, Himachal Pradesh recorded the highest numbers in actual power generation with a growth of 16.11%, whereas in the western region, Gujarat recorded the highest numbers with a growth of 15.04%. Telangana led the way in the southern region with a growth of 7.78%, whereas Sikkim came on top in the eastern region with a growth of 24.72%. In the northeastern region, Arunachal Pradesh came on top with a growth of 18.57%, whereas the power imported from Bhutan grew by 28.45% as compared to the last year.
Last year, India recorded a power supply deficit of 0.6% in the nine months between April and December 2018. During this period, 965.589bn kWh of energy were supplied against the demand of 971.490bn kWh.
HYDRO
Egat, B.Grimm sign major floating solar deal
Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (Egat) has signed a contract with B.Grimm Power-Energy China Consortium to develop the world’s largest hydro floating solar hybrid power project at Sirindhorn dam in Ubon Ratchathani.
The 45MW project floating solar farm will be built at a cost of THB842mn ($27mn). The consortium will develop the power project under an engineering, procurement and construction contract.
Thepparat Theppitak, Egat’s deputy governor for power plant development and renewable energy, said Sirindhorn dam was the pilot project for the hybrid system, with 36MW hydropower generation to enlarge capacity optimisation.
“Egat is committed to the floating solar farms at nine dams nationwide with a combined capacity of 2,725MW,” he said.
“Egat plans to install energy management and storage system in coming years.”
Preeyanart Soontornwata, president of B.Grimm Power Plc, said Egat invited bids for this project at Sirindhorn dam.
In the future, an energy storage system would potentially be applied with the project to increase reliability for renewable energy production.
NUCLEAR
Turkey is to consider
ending its partnership with
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries
to develop the country’s
second nuclear plant at
Sinop, Energy Minister Fatih
Dönmez said on Jan. 19.
He told state-run Anadolu Agency that the time schedule and pricing of the nuclear power plant at Sinop fell short of the ministry’s expectations after the results of feasibility studies, carried out by Japanese Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd., came out.
“We agreed with the Japanese side to not continue our cooperation regarding this matter,” Dönmez said.
The minister added that Turkey can hold
P10
w w w. N E W S B A S E . c o m
Week 03 22•January•2020