SINGAPORE (Reuters) -Singapore is prepared to grant 30-year import licences to companies investing billions of dollars in low-carbon electricity projects, the head of its energy regulator said on Wednesday, in a move aimed at helping the firms recoup their initial investments.
The city-state aims to import 6 gigawatts (GW) of low-carbon electricity by 2035 and has awarded conditional approvals for 10 such projects in Australia, Cambodia, Indonesia and Vietnam.
“It will cost billions of dollars to have these large solar farms and the large battery set up in order to levelize the energy supply,” Puah Kok Keong, CEO at the Energy Market Authority, said at the Singapore International Energy Week.
He added that the laying of power cables to connect Singapore with other countries will also be costly.
“From the Singapore side, we are prepared to give a fairly long term, 30-year import licence for the companies that have invested in this project, because we understand the high upfront investment and the time needed to recover your investments,” Puah said.
(Reporting by Florence Tan in Singapore; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and Janane Venkatraman)
