I am very happy today to preside over the inauguration of the Sesan Kraom II hydropower with its output of 400 megawatts – the biggest hydropower in the Kingdom of Cambodia. It is the seventh hydropower plant that I came myself to launch the groundbreaking ceremony and to close the dam, and I also come today to put it into official use […]
National Road 78 Built in Detour for Sesan Kraom II
I wish to take this opportune moment to remind you that the Sesan Kraom II is a three-country joint investment initiated by the first Cambodian – Oknha Kith Meng. He first came to me to seek for support on this investment project which he thought of cooperating with a Vietnam company. I could remember former Deputy Prime Minister HE Keat Chhon and Minister of Energy and Mines, HE Suy Sem, jointly inspect the project site and proposed a detour of the national road 78 from the expected project’s reservoir. What we have done here has been taken seriously with careful studies […] we built national road in detour of the reservoir that connects waterways from two main rivers – Sre Pok and Sesan […]
I used to bring up this investment project with the late Prime Minister Phan Van Khai of Vietnam. However, both companies – Vietnam and Cambodia, had had insufficient capital for the project. That was when a company from China came in to fulfil this plan. It has been in my thought if the Sesan Kraom II could not have become a realized plan in 2018, how are we going to address demand for electricity in Cambodia? How would that affect our efforts to promote economic growth? The three companies from three different countries work together on a 51% share from China, 39% share from Cambodia and the remaining 10% share from Vietnam. It has become a joint venture. Power generated from this dam not only provides for Stoeng Treng alone but also goes to addressing need for electricity in Phnom Penh […]
Residential Plot and Five Hectare of Cultivation Land in Compensation
I appreciate efforts of the companies and the then governor of Stoeng Treng for addressing my priority, which is to ensure good compensation for people (who have agreed to move out of the dam reservoir) with land for their residences and each family receives another five hectares of land for cultivation. The company had also assisted them with clearing and plowing land. We had to find more fertile land and swapped them for some families received land that were uncultivable. A majority of people living in the area supports this development project. There are few who continues to create difficulties as they have been provoked by some foreign circles […]
What amuses me was that there had been some foreigners coming to my house and told me that if the project to build the Sesan Kraom II was to go ahead, Cambodia would lose up to 70% of its fish population. I told them I found it a surprise to know that fish in my country are swimming up mountains […] while a majority of our fish population are in the Tonle Sap and Mekong rivers. They brought that issue to me as if I did not know the problem […]
Learning from Nam Ngum Dam
I had a bird eyes’ view of the area before landing. For me, I first saw and knew about two hydropower plants. The first one I saw in 1982/83 in the Volgograd River of the former Soviet Union. They build a dam across the river. I do not know where it lies in the present Russia. The dam reservoir has become a popular place for people to fish. The second dam that I knew of before we build hydropower dams in Cambodia was the Nam Ngum power plant in Laos […] it has given us a good lesson to learn about closing dam. In Laos’s Nam Ngum, they close dam before removing and clearing logs and trees from the reservoir area. After they closed the dam to catch water, forest was flooded. Later, companies had had to cut trees from under water […] we learnt of this issue and we did it before we close the dam to avoid having problems of floating objects to obstruct turbines […]
Power Generation Planned Slower Than Rapid Demands
Yesterday I asked the Minister attached to the Prime Minister’s office in charge of electricity of Cambodia Keo Ratanak to report to me about prices of electricity and what next for Cambodia’s electricity. According to his report, there has been an indication of growing demand for electricity, for instance, as influx of investment happens to Preah Sihanouk province, its consumption of electricity has increased from between ten and twenty megawatts to over 100 megawatts. In Siem Reap too, its consumption level has reached 100 megawatts. To address the growing need for electricity, we must think of how to fill in those needs. Our plan to generate power has not been correct because of rapid demand for energy. While the World Bank predicted that Phnom Penh would need about 12% more electricity, in reality, Phnom Penh already increased electricity demand by over 20% […] we must continue to make effort on this front. We cannot stop with this project. There has been an indication now that if we could not produce more power and maintained our predicted course of demand, we would face with problem of lacking electricity by 2020/21 […]
Electricite du Cambodge (EDC) to Outreach Supply to 12 Remaining Locations
On another front, we also have to work harder to build transmission lines to supply electricity to provinces and locations that are still out of reach. HE Keo Ratanak told me that national transmission lines have now covered 96% of the country, with only twelve remaining locations currently using between 2-300 Riel/KWH electricity produced by private generator to go. I urge that EDC discusses with the Ministry of Economy and Finance to work on building transmission lines to those locations […] this is the point that we need to see through. In percentage, we have provided electricity to 12,305 villages or 86.85% of the whole villages in the country […] that electricity has now reached our target locations, we need to produce more electricity and that means we need to have more networks or transmission lines.
Seeking China’s Loans for Transmission Lines
We have been working hard to get our transmission line up running from Sesan Kraom II to Phnom Penh. We get a loan from India to build transmission from Stoeng Treng to Kratie and private companies from Kratie to Kompong Cham province. From Kompong Cham to Phnom Penh, a private company builds it on BOT agreement. We already supplied electricity to 20/25 provinces/cities. We need more capital to build lines to supply electricity to more provinces […]
I would take this opportune moment to inform the Chinese new Ambassador that in my upcoming visit to China, I wish to have a negotiation on a robust loan for building transmission lines. I am asking you to convey my wish to President HE Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang that besides seeking China’s assistance in building roads and water canals, I am in need of more capital to build transmission lines. Our friend China has built seven hydropower plants and we are putting into official operation the seventh one today. The six other hydropower plants that China built are Kirirom I and II in Kompong Speu, Komjay in Kompot, and A Tai, Russei Jrum Kraom and Ta Tai in Koh Kong province […]
CPP Fulfills Electoral Promises on Electricity
Please allow me to take this chance to announce plan in which we are going to bring down electricity prices for 2019 and 2020. I am also placing a new instruction for EDC and the Ministry of Mines and Energy to conduct a study to further bring down prices of electricity in 2021 and from 2021 onward. Last night I watched a reportage with interviews of people in Stoeng Treng on CNC. A young female trader said the current price of electricity is lower now but it would be better to lower more. We are on 17 December today and in 14 days from today we will see that what the Cambodian People’s Party promised (to bring prices of electricity down) will be true […] it is more like a statement on prices of electricity but let me remind that we will conduct studies on electricity prices for a period from 2021 to 2025 to bring the price down further […] I need to clarify this point because there are always people who twist around what I say to fake the news […]
No Projects with China Postponed or Canceled
I think the government and people of the People’s Republic of China for urging their companies to invest in Cambodia. In time of economic downturn and financial crisis in 2008, I was very concerned if we were able to go ahead on projects that we had agreed with our friend China either building roads, bridges, and others. Luckily, no project got postponed and/or canceled. They have all been implemented successfully. In this area, we have the national road 7 that links up Stoeng Treng, and from there Ratanakiri, to the border with Laos, the bridge across the Sekong River, etc. We also have one new road built naming national road 9. It was built at the time when the world was in economic crisis. We built another bridge across the Mekong at Stoeng Treng to connect with Preah Vihear. Would anyone Cambodian have thought or imagined of all these? […]
CPP to Launch Three-Day Conference
I come with Deputy Prime Minister Chea Sophara. I am very happy to see people’s efforts in their cultivation and they are ready to harvest rubber, cashew nuts and other industrial crops on land that were left empty […] tomorrow, the Cambodian People’s Party will spend the next three days discuss works to do to respond to, and to gather higher, trust of the Cambodian people. We will figure out how to bring our country from lower-middle income to higher-middle income status in 2030. I hope every party delegates have already asked for leave from work to join the Party’s conference […] I am concerned with the fact that I have gained weight […] I think I have forty more years to live at least and ten more years to work as Prime Minister. I will continue with this task until I am sure that filthy opposition will not be able to cause (Cambodia) a destruction as I am the one who can stop them […]./.
