French renewables company EDF Renewables has made an undisclosed investment in a Vietnamese rooftop solar power developer SkyXSolar, through the latter's holding company SkyX Energy. SkyX Solar is also a subsidiary of Vietnamese investment management company VinaCapital.
SkyX Solar develops distributed energy projects for commercial and industrial (C&I) customers in Vietnam with around 30 MW of cumulative capacity under operational currently out of around 100 MW in operation and/or under development. Over the next few years, it aims to scale up to 200 MW rooftop solar and distributed energy capacity with an investment of over $100 million. Support of a strategic partner as EDF Renewables is expected to help the company achieve the aim, VinaCapital added.
"The potential for renewables in Vietnam is enormous, and we are keen to expand our footprint in the country drawing on our global knowhow in rooftop solar solutions," explained Southeast Asia Director of EDF Renewables Yalim Ozilhan.
To date, Vietnam has reached an installed capacity of 9.58 GW of rooftop solar that has remained quite constant since January 2021 (see Vietnam: Rooftop Solar Installed Capacity Exceeds 9.5 GW). In March 2021, there were media reports suggesting that the Ministry of Industry and Trade may lower rooftop PV's feed-in-tariff (FIT) by up to 38% to lower pressure on grid (see Vietnam To Slash FIT Rates For Rooftop Solar Projects).