Thailand plans to increase coal use in power generation

• 6 years ago (2018-04-13)
• David Flin

Asia 846 Coal 273

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Siri Jirapongphan, Thailand’s Energy Minister, said that the country is expected to increase the share of electricity generated by coal to diversify its fuel mix for generation. He said: “The share of coal in our power generation mix is very low, at slightly less than 20 per cent. We need to diversify the sources of fuel for our power generation. Having a reasonable percentage of coal to be used for power generation would be a necessity in considering the security of fuel supply to our generation system.”

Thailand relies mainly on natural gas to generate power, but domestic demand is falling behind consumption, requiring the country to import more gas from Myanmar and elsewhere.

The Energy Minister said: “We need to conduct a strategic environmental assessment to identify a suitable location to build a coal-fired power plant.” He added that a decision on location could be made towards the end of this year. He also claimed that Thailand has aggressively promoted the use of renewable energy, and the share of electricity generation from renewables has reached 12 per cent, the highest are among countries making up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.