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Myanmar’s electricity plan in its NDC
MYANMAR’S ELECTRICITY PLANS IN ITS NDC
With the business-as-usual plans of 23.594GW by 2030, based on the National Electricity Master Plan (2014), Myanmar has made slight changes to its energy-mix plans in its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and as a part of its commitments to the Paris Agreement.
Table 2: Business-as-usual Energy-Mix Plan by 2030
Generation Technology MW Capacity Factor MW (%) Efficiency
RE: (Hydro)
8,896 RE: Other (Solar & Wind) 2,000 38%
9%
Coal / Thermal 7,940 0.8 33% 45%
Gas
Total
4,758 0.8 20% 60%
23,594 100%
Based on current energy supply and demand scenarios, Myanmar now aspires to achieve over 18GW by 2030 in the new energy-mix targets, compared to the business-as-usual plans of 23.594GW. In the new target the share of coal in the energy-mix substantially decreases and has the potential to decrease still further based on the availability of international support. Myanmar therefore has set two targets in its NDC for the energy sector – unconditional targets and conditional targets.
Table 3: Unconditional Energy-Mix Targets by 2030
2020 2025 2030
Generation Technology MW % MW % MW %
RE: Hydro 2,771 46.5% 3,388 31% 5,156 28% RE: Other (Solar & Wind) 40 0.7% 1,440 13.% 2,000 11% Natural Gas / LNG 3,031 50.8% 5,031 46% 6,063 33% Coal 120 2% 720 6.5% 3,620 20%
Intl. Interconnection - - 400 3.5% 1,400 8% Total 5,962 100% 10,979 100% 18,239 100%
Table 4: Conditional Energy-Mix Targets by 2030
2020 2025 2030
Generation Technology MW % MW % MW %
RE: Hydro 2,771 46.5% 3,388 32% 5,676 31% RE: Other (Solar & Wind) 40 0.7% 1,680 15.83% 3,070 17% Natural Gas / LNG 3,031 50.8% 5,031 47.37% 6,063 33% Coal 120 2% 120 1.1% 2,120 11%
Intl. Interconnection - - 400 3.7% 1,400 8% Total 6,962 100% 10,619 100% 18,329 100%
Under the unconditional targets (18.239GW), Myanmar intends to mobilize domestic resources. Under conditional targets (18.329GW), Myanmar expects international assistance to meet energy targets set to avoid CO2 emissions. Under the unconditional targets Myanmar will decrease the share of coal by 54.4% (4.32GW) by 2030. However with international support, Myanmar intends to decrease the share of coal by 73.29% (5.82GW) by 2030 compared to business-as-usual targets.
The share of new renewables under the unconditional targets will remain the same as business-as usual, but under conditional targets, the share of renewables will increase by 53.5% (1.07GW). With the socio-environmental issues related to hydropower and also given the intermittent characteristics of the new renewable technologies, Myanmar intends to: substantially decrease the share of hydropower by 42.04% (3.74GW) under unconditional targets and by 36.19% (3.22GW) under conditional targets; limitedly scale up renewable energy technologies; and increase the share of natural gas and LNG by 27.42% (1.305GW) under both unconditional and conditional target scenarios.
Storage or Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) offer solutions to overcome the intermittent quality of the new renewable energy technologies. With renewable energies and storage also becoming cheaper, the deployment and demonstration of the combination of such technologies together will be key to ensure the rapid phasing out of fossil fuel based technologies, which will in turn help avoid or reduce GHG emissions. To make this a reality, Myanmar will need international technical and financial support as soon as possible, including support to overcome policy barriers to create the right environment for the deployment of new renewables.
The NDC also outlines the need for nearly US$1.2 billion to address policy, technical analysis, capacity building, improving energy efficiency and blending finance to de-risk investments in renewables. Thus, with these investments coming in, Myanmar will be able to avoid 105.25 million tCO2e by 2030 under unconditional targets and 144.04 million tCO2e by 2030 under conditional targets based on the business-as-usual emissions of 297.01 million tCO2e by 2030.
Moreover, despite existing renewable energy targets in the NDC, Myanmar has also identified potential renewable energy projects (solar and wind) including hydro (though it must be executed in a socio-environmentally sensitive way) for the further scaling-up of clean energy. However, pre-feasibility and feasibility assessments are pending and currently not addressed in the NDC as part of the targets. This is also complemented by the fact that Myanmar intends to peak its share of coal targets by 2030 and will proceed to slowly phase out coal by 2050, which means the identified projects need to progress as soon as possible to understand this goal`s feasibility, economy and deployment.
