CLEAN ENERGY AND ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Improving energy efficiency and increasing the proportion of use of renewable and clean energy has become the world’s indispensable trend and was agreed to by 195 countries in the Paris Agreement on Climate Change on 12 December 2015 in Paris within the framework of the 21^st United Nations Conference on Climate Change COP21 in order to limit temperature rises to less than 2⁰C.

During the 2011 – 2015 period, by adopting policies energy saving and efficiency, it is estimated that Vietnam successfully saved almost 6% of its total energy consumption; a lot of green and renewable energy products were manufactured domestically; some solar-, wind- and biomass power plants have been built… which have initially engaged the participation of the private sector.

However, there remain gaps and problems with the legal and policy frameworks; Vietnam’s renewable energy potential is still untapped; Vietnam is still among energy-intensive countries and very much affected by climate change; private sector’s investment in the development of clean energy sector and energy saving and efficiency. On the other hand, barriers still persist and need to be addressed including: 1) lack of detailed guidelines for policies after adoption, policies still impede the implementation of investment incentives, tax exemption, as well as subsidy for the development of renewable energy industry and application of technologies to improve energy saving and efficiency; 2) challenges to businesses in getting access to focal point agencies for evaluation of application and production technologies, use of clean energy as well as energy saving and efficiency; 3) lack of technical regulations on how to evaluate effectiveness of scientific researches and application of new technologies; 4) lack of a mechanism to enable investment in energy saving service (ESCO)etc.

To encourage private businesses to proactively participate in the development of clean energy, promotion of energy saving and efficiency in different ways including public–private partnership (PPP), private investment, investment in energy saving projects – ESCO, joint ventures… we would like to call upon the government to 1) Promptly improve policy framework to facilitate the development of renewable energy industry; 2) Adopt flexible policies which provide incentives also to the clean energy volume produced, and capacity of facilities installed, during the R&D, to pilot and initial production stages; and offer favorable conditions to the facilities set up in remote areas and islands; 3) Establish key organization to evaluate in a prompt and standardized manner the clean energy production and application technologies, and energy saving and efficiency; 4) Promote a sound management system, provide transparent, convenient and timely financial support; engage enterprises in the policy making process as well as in regular policy evaluation to benefit from their recommendations for policy improvement; 5) Maintain existing policies that provide support and incentivizes businesses to adopt various solutions to promote  energy saving and efficiency.

We would like to recommend that the Government and authorities of all levels to 1) improve investment related policy making process, raise policy awareness and enhance policy implementation in order equal treatment among public and private sector entities; 2) Remove subsidies for fossil fuels, while implementing policies to promote clean energy; 3) Support R&D on technology transfer to produce renewable energy products, and thereby enhance the local contents of products; 4) Effectively support inventions and applications of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies; 5) Create a policy framework to engage commercial banks to provide guarantees to the investment projects on clean energy and energy efficiency technologies; 6) Issue protections for ESCO enterprises; 7) Provide detailed guidance on how to apply for preferences and support (tax, interest rate,..)

As a message for international organizations and partners, private enterprises are willing and ready to cooperate in 1) researches, transfer of advanced technologies in order to exploit renewable energy resources, and generate renewable energy products; 2) support for and delivery of training, experience sharing, capacity building on renewable energy development; 3) setting up joint ventures in producing renewable energy exploiting equipment and improve energy saving and efficiency; 4) making investment and facilitating access to funding for R&D and implementation of projects on renewable energy development.