Economical use of energy or green energy use will bring many benefits to the economy and the environment. This fact has been demonstrated evidently in many major cities around the world. Vietnam also has many solutions, specific support policies to realize the application of energy saving solutions and green energy use in production and daily life.

Development of energy saving models

As reported by the HCM city Department of Science and Technology (MOST), to realize the technological innovations for green growth, since 2002, under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee, the Department of Science and Technology has provided solutions and technological innovation to many units of various fields such as industries, buildings, urban infrastructure, and transportation.

In the industrial sector, since 2002 HCM City has assisted 588 enterprises in 24 different sectors, to save an average of 931.9 million kWh of electricity per year, 5.68 million liters of oil, and deflation 600 thousand tons of CO2 emissions. In ​​urban infrastructure, it is the high-performance lighting accounting for 90% of private owned system for public lighting, saving 75.6% as compared to the old system. Mr. Nguyen Van Phuoc, Deputy Director of city Department of Natural Resources - Environment, says, in an action plan to adapt to climate change, the focuses on energy saving solutions. Accordingly, the city has been in deployment of numerous pilot projects, such as public lighting using energy-saving lamps; greenhouse gas inventories; renewable biogas energy from organic waste with capacity of 40-60 tons/day at Binh Dien agricultural product wholesale market; urban solid waste treatment Project combined with regeneration of energy (electricity and heat) at a capacity of 400-600 tons/day.

Production Workshop of a company installed with LED lamps to save power

In this regard, the representatives of HCM city Power Corporation say that in recent years the units of the corporation have implemented several measures for promotion and gained positive results. Specifically, the "typical power saving street route" in order to advise the individuals, businesses, customers, the units which display outdoor billboards, lighted advertisement boards in open parks for timely turning-off the lighting; cutting down to 50% of the bulbs for the outdoor billboards, signs boards, to reduce the amount of power consumption with indoor light bulbs also, setting the air conditioning at more than 25^oC. The outputs show that, after 3 years of development, now 69 street route lighting has been improved, with the participation of over 14,000 customers, 1.2 million kWh savings, equivalent to over VND2.1 billion. It is not only the achievement that counts, in recently, the company has organized, promoted and mobilized its customers to use electricity-saving devices such as compact fluorescent light, solar energy water heater, and LEDs. During the period 2006-2010, the company sold 350,000 compact fluorescent light bulbs with lower support price at least 10% -20% lower than the market price.

Synchronization of Solutions

In the opinion of environmental experts, in the context of climate change and strongly increasing global integration trend, to catch the opportunity to become dynamic in green growth, the world has chosen the solutions for more economical and efficient use of energy. For efficient use of energy in the area of ​​urban development, HCM City needs to develop human resources for the energy management at the energy consuming facilities. The urban development area should be planned with the construction works in sync with the traffic infrastructure, and public services. The ​​urban development construction area must comply with construction standards for energy efficiency in buildings in order to calculate the cost-effective investment projections before the construction. It is encouraged to use the energy saving labeled building materials and products, to develop the green buildings, to build the centers for provision of steam heat to improve the efficiency of cooling, heating in urban areas. It is also to develop the market for high-performance technology and power and energy saving equipment.

On the other hand, the city also needs to initiate support mechanisms in terms of guidelines and policies in shaping the programs and strategies for energy saving, renewable energy applications on a large scale. Besides, the corporation will promote the dissemination of educational information in the community to raise awareness of energy saving and efficiency which is also significant. It is necessary to integrate the energy saving program in regular activities of social life. Also, the city also supports the mechanisms for businesses which perform energy audits and new investment in technology, to replace the old equipment with high-performance equipment at the request of the energy audit report. Regarding the governance responsibility, the city authority is expected to enact the mechanisms and policies to support solar power development and provide the guidance for acquisition and purchase of excess power from households' solar energy system to feed the grid. Having achieved it, the encouragement for development of new green energy source could better mobilize the capital from the community.

Trong Tan