The Laos-China Railway will be environmentally friendly and low-carbon.

[ASEAN NOW]

 

The China Southern Power Grid Company has finished installing electricity transmission poles along the Laos-China Railway, which will be a green, low-carbon electrified railway, according to the company.

The Laos-China railway's external power grid project is now complete and ready to deliver electricity to the railway, which is set to open in early December this year.

 

According to KPL, the project contains 2,220 transmission poles with a total length of 936 kilometers and connections to 24 traction substations.

 

The China Southern Electricity System (CSG) and Electricite du Laos Transmission Company Limited (EDLT), a joint venture founded last year to operate Laos' power grid, worked together on the project.

 

The Laos-China Railway is a symbol of the Belt and Road Initiative, according to Chinese experts, and a vital component in Laos' transformation from a landlocked to a land-linked country.

 

“We will cooperate with Electricite du Laos (EDL) to build trust in the provision of electricity to the Laos-China Railway, and we will engage with all sectors to ensure prosperous development,” stated Ms. Yang Yonghui, Chair of the Board of Directors of Lao-China Electric Power Investment Co., Ltd.

 

“The mountains and rivers of Laos and the mountains and rivers of China are the heritage of both nations, so we have built this railway to be a green, low-carbon railway that will become a path for development this century that will bring many positive developments,” Mr. Huang Wun Kang, Director of Electricite du Laos Transmission Company Limited, said of the completed project.

 

Meanwhile, Zhong Xiaotao, Director-General of the China Southern Power Grid Company (CSG), claims that the Laos-China Railway will be a green and low-carbon electrified railway that will help the country develop in a variety of ways.

 

According to him, the significance lies in environmental and ecological protection by using the same building standards and cutting-edge technology used in China to reduce environmental risks, while the electricity transmission pole project has helped train local people in grid operation and management in order to create jobs and ensure power supply.

 

Early last year, Laos and China started the country's first build-operate-transfer power grid project for the Laos-China railway.

 

The project contains 20 circuits of 115kV transmission lines running along the China-Laos railway across five provincial administrative areas in northern Laos.

 

The Laos-China Railway will be 426 kilometers long, with 198 kilometers of tunnels and 62 kilometers of bridges. It will travel from the Boten border gate, which connects Northern Laos to China, to Vientiane Capital, at a speed of 160 kilometers per hour, and is nearly complete.