VietNamNet Bridge – HCM City yesterday approved a programme to support businesses that produce and sell solar-powered water heaters.

Visitors look at a solar-powered water heater at Phu Tho exhibition centre in HCM City.

It comes at a time when the country faces power shortages and has been warned it would be among the countries worst affected by climate change and rise in sea level.

To avoid a serious enormous power shortage in the future, the Government has called the public participating in a national programme in using solar energy in order saving electricity power.

It could put 30,000 solar-powered water heaters each with a 180-litre capacity on the market by 2013.

The Government will offer customers a VND1 million subsidy for buying it.

The five-year programme also aims to propagate the benefits of solar energy among the public and indigenise the technology to make solar-powered water heaters. Vietnam now imports hundred of thousands of such units and accessories every year.

Pham Huy Phong, the research head at HCM City’s Energy Conservation Centre, said the programme’s 30,000 solar heaters could help save 57 million kWh of electricity power and cut greenhouse gas emissions by 23,541 tonnes every year.

Huynh Kim Tuoc, the centre’s head, said domestic consumption, especially during peak hours, accounts for 35 per cent of energy use in HCM City and 45 per cent nation-wide.

The centre also plans to help host the first exhibition on energy-saving products from November 7 to 9.

In recent times the city’s power shortage has become increasingly dire. Demand is now 1,000 to 2,500 megawatts in excess of supply everyday, Nguyen Van Ly, deputy head of the HCM City Power Company, said.

(Source: Viet Nam News)