On the afternoon of July 11, continuing the 8th Session, under the direction of Vice Chairman of the National Assembly Nguyen Duc Hai, the National Assembly discussed in the hall the draft Law on Electricity (amended).
According to the Government's Submission, the draft Electricity Law (amended) consists of 9 chapters and 130 articles. The development of the Electricity Law project aims to institutionalize the Party and State's guidelines and policies, the National Assembly's Resolutions on developing a socialist-oriented market economy, enhancing national competitiveness, building and developing the electricity sector in accordance with the country's socio-economic development conditions. Ensuring the State's unified management of electricity activities, promoting decentralization and delegation of power.
Review of electricity development policy in islands
Commenting on the draft Electricity Law (amended), many National Assembly deputies agreed that it is necessary to amend the Electricity Law, because the current Law lacks many contents that have arisen in practice, so there needs to be a specific legal basis for regulations and instructions for implementation, in line with the general development trend. The amendment of the Electricity Law needs to simultaneously meet both the immediate goal of ensuring national energy security, but also the long-term goal of fully implementing Vietnam's international commitment to achieve zero net emissions by 2050.
Commenting on the specific content of the draft Law related to the State's policy on electricity development (Article 5), delegate Nguyen Huu Thong - National Assembly Delegation of Binh Thuan province expressed his high agreement with the policies on electricity development in rural areas, ethnic minority areas, mountainous areas, border areas, islands and areas with particularly difficult socio-economic conditions as in the draft Law, which are given priority by the State in allocating investment capital and having preferential policies on investment and finance. However, the delegate contributed comments on the policy on electricity development in islands because the development of electricity in coastal and island areas is very specific.
According to the delegate, most of our country's islands are several dozen to several hundred kilometers away from the mainland. To meet the electricity needs of the people as well as develop the socio-economy and ensure national security and defense, the state invests a lot of money in building diesel, wind, and solar power plants or bringing electricity to the islands (for example, bringing electricity to Con Dao costs 5,000 billion VND; Co To: 1,100 billion VND, Phu Quoc: 2,221 billion VND...) and also has to compensate for losses every year, specifically Phu Quy Island in Binh Thuan, in addition to investing in a diesel power plant, it has to compensate for losses every year, in 2023 alone, it will lose about 170 billion VND.
To ensure electricity development on the islands, delegates proposed that the Government have a policy allowing islanders to install rooftop solar power that is linked and generates excess capacity to the grid. On islands with independent power systems, not connected to the national power system, the power will be purchased at a price equal to the ceiling price of solar power plants according to Decision No. 21/QD-BCT dated January 7, 2023 of the Ministry of Industry and Trade on promulgating the transitional price framework for generating electricity from solar and wind power plants.
The delegate analyzed that if the above mechanism is applied, Phu Quy Island will save 12.031 billion VND/year in diesel power generation costs for every 1 MWp of customers installing rooftop solar power for the State. Thus, the State will have less compensation, but people will still have electricity for production and business, socio-economic development and as a base for Truong Sa and DK1 platform. If the above policy is applied, the delegate said that not only Phu Quy Island but also other islands in our country will have enough electricity to use and save a lot of State resources because they do not have to compensate for losses or not bring grid power to the island.
Commenting on the form of selecting investors for power projects (Article 26), delegate Nguyen Huu Thong said that at point a, clause 2, the draft Law stipulates: "Projects approved by competent authorities in principle and at the same time approved by investors do not go through auctions of land use rights, and do not bid to select investors according to the provisions of law on investment".
Delegates proposed to clarify that power grid projects serving socio-economic development for national and public interests invested by state-owned enterprises in accordance with the planning do not have to carry out procedures for approving investment policies and simultaneously approving investors. Because power grid projects serving socio-economic development, for national and public interests and power projects are route projects, invested in accordance with approved planning. To carry out procedures for approving investment policies and simultaneously approving investors, it is required that each pillar foundation location and route corridor must be consistent with land use planning, construction planning, urban planning, rural planning, transportation, irrigation, etc.
“While the power line corridor extends through many communes and districts, to implement the investment approval, the above plans must be adjusted, while the planning cycle is 10 years and mid-term adjustment (about 5 years) will lead to projects being behind schedule according to the plan, affecting the supply of electricity for socio-economic development and energy security,” said the delegate.
Regarding the development of electricity from new energy (Article 34), the delegate said that Clause 2 of the draft law stipulates that “The electricity buyer and the electricity seller shall agree in the electricity purchase and sale contract on the minimum guaranteed electricity output mobilized in the year for power plants connected to the national electricity system within the time limit prescribed by the Government”. According to the delegate, the above provision is not sufficient and it is proposed to add additional contents such as investment guarantees, foreign currency conversion, commitments on technology transfer and use of domestic goods and services, state guarantees to implement investment projects in the electricity purchase and sale contract and the Government shall specify this content in detail in accordance with Article 27.
Reviewing regulations on prohibited acts in electricity activities
Participating in the discussion at the hall, delegate Cam Thi Man - National Assembly Delegation of Thanh Hoa province agreed that it is necessary to comprehensively amend the Electricity Law based on the grounds stated in the Government's Submission to fully and comprehensively institutionalize the Party's guidelines and policies, the State's policies and laws on national energy development.
Commenting on the electricity development policy stipulated in Article 5 of the draft Law, the delegate said that Article 5 of the draft Law consists of 15 clauses with principles and contents expressing specific policies of the State on electricity development. Some of these contents and policies have been assigned to the Government based on practical situations to specify in detail. However, the policies are basically stipulated in the draft Law in the most general way to institutionalize the State's viewpoints and policies on electricity, but there are no regulations on assigning competent agencies to specify in detail these policies. This may lead to the difficulty of these policies coming into effect when the law comes into effect.
Therefore, to ensure consistency in understanding and applying the law; effectiveness, publicity and transparency for each policy, avoid creating a mechanism of asking for and giving, negativity and waste, especially ensuring the feasibility of the law, delegates suggested reviewing the contents of Article 5 to clearly identify which contents and groups of policies need to be assigned detailed regulations and the competent authority assigned to provide detailed regulations.
Regarding the prohibited acts in electricity activities and electricity use stipulated in Article 8 of the draft Law, through research, delegate Cam Thi Man said that the provision of prohibited acts by listing method may lead to incomplete prohibited acts, not being general and comprehensive; there are contents between clauses that overlap in content and meaning; there are contents that have been stipulated in other documents or are not necessary to be stipulated in this law. Therefore, it is proposed to review the prohibited acts in the draft law to ensure generality, comprehensiveness and non-duplication.
Specifically, in Clause 2 and Clause 3 of the draft, there is an overlap in the general act of theft. Thus, these two clauses can be combined into one clause to provide general provisions on the prohibition of the act of stealing electricity and electrical equipment. At the same time, replace the verb “destruction” in Clause 3 with the words and phrases “destruction” and “intentional damage to electrical equipment” to ensure consistency with the provisions of law on handling administrative and criminal liability for these acts.
The prohibited acts stipulated in clauses 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 have many overlapping points in content, and the use, exploitation and management of electricity, electrical works or related works all have their own specific standards and criteria, so they can be generalized. On the other hand, the description of prohibited acts by the listing method is unscientific and not strict. Therefore, the delegate proposed to consider unifying and generalizing the provisions in clauses 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 to stipulate them as a single clause in the following direction: "It is strictly forbidden to commit acts that violate the regulations on the operation, exploitation, management and use of electricity, the safety corridor of electrical works, regulations on the protection of electrical works, electrical safety and the safety of dams and hydroelectric reservoirs".
In Clause 12, the prohibition on the act of "Causing harassment, annoyance, and illegal profiteering in electricity activities and electricity use" is stipulated. The delegate said that in this case, the act of causing harassment should be regulated by ethical norms in the internal rules and regulations of the agency or unit, which is more appropriate. Regarding the act of "making illegal profiteering in electricity activities and electricity use", this provision is not clear and it is not necessary to stipulate it in this law because the law already has general provisions on handling responsibilities for acts of illegal profiteering, both administratively and criminally. Therefore, it is proposed to remove the provision in Clause 12, Article 8 of the draft Law.
Source: https://baotainguyenmoitruong.vn/quoc-hoi-thao-luan-tai-hoi-truong-ve-du-an-luat-dien-luc-sua-doi-382854.html
Comment (0)