Cambodia ditches plans for Mekong hydropower plants

The two announced projects at Sambor and Stung Treng have been frozen.

Cambodia has abandoned plans to build two new hydropower plants on the Mekong River for the next decade, according to a government master plan for the period 2020-2030. The country will instead bet on power supply from coal, LNG, imports and solar.

Two large dam projects at Sambor (2.5GW) and Stung Treng (1.2GW) were announced and authorised, but the projects are now frozen.

Also read: Policy gaps plague lower Mekong amidst hydropower backlash

In January 2020, Laos commissioned the 260MW Don Sahong hydro project, which utilises 15% of the total Mekong River's flow and supplies the produced electricity to the Cambodia national grid under a 30-year agreement.

In 2018, hydropower accounted for 56% of Cambodia’s power generation. Over the same period, the country imported 20% of its electricity consumption, mostly from Vietnam and Thailand.

This article was originally published by Enerdata.