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05 August 2011
Thailand’s banks have responded eagerly to the demands of the country’s renewables and small power developers. But big-ticket IPPs are more likely to come from Thailand’s neighbour, Laos, than from domestic sources. Tom Nelthorpe reports from Bangkok.
“I’ve always thought that as an untouchable national institution in Thailand, EGAT [the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand] is up there with the monarchy.” The American lawyer, based in Bangkok, is rightly wary of upsetting either of them, and preferred to remain nameless. But he highlights one reason why lenders are so fond of Bangkok’s power procurement framework, and the frustrations that it can present to foreign developers and lenders.
The recent Thai election pitted the incumbent prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, from Thailand’s broadly conservative and royalist Democrat Party, against Yingluck Shinawatra, head of the newly-formed Pheu Thai party, and sister of deposed populist prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Shinawatra subsequently won a convincing victory, though she has said little about what changes, if any, she plans to make to Thai energy policy.
Thailand’s political history since 2008 has been bloody, as different factions, which adopted different-coloured t-shirts, battled in the streets. Through...
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