LAND, PUBLIC WORKS AND UTILITIES
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The two supply companies are investor-owned and do not operate on a franchise basis. The government monitors their performance through mutually-agreed Scheme of Control Agreements. Current agreements with CLP and HEC came into effect on October 1, 1993 and January 1, 1994, respectively. Both will last for 15 years and interim reviews will be carried out in 1998 and 2003. The agreements require each company to seek the government's approval for certain aspects of their financing plans, including projected tariff levels.
Electricity for HEC's supply areas is supplied from the Lamma Power Station. At the end of 1997, total installed capacity at the Lamma Power Station was 3 305MW.
HEC's transmission system operates at 275kV, 132kV and 66kV and distribution is effected mainly at 11kV and 380 volts. Apart from a small proportion of 132kV overhead transmission lines, all supplies are transmitted and distributed by underground or submarine cables.
The Castle Peak Power Company Limited (CAPCO), which is 60 per cent owned by Exxon Energy Limited and 40 per cent by CLP, supplies electricity to CLP from its Black Point (1 250MW), Castle Peak (4 168MW) and Penny's Bay (300MW) Power Stations, with the total installed capacity being 5 718MW. Tsing Yi 'A' and 'B' power stations (1 520MW) as well as seven gas turbine units (442MW) at Tsing Yi and Castle Peak were decommissioned in stages over 1994, 1995 and 1997.
The government has approved CLP's installation of four more 312MW generators in the new power station at Black Point, Tuen Mun. Two are planned to be commissioned in 1998 and 1999. The remaining two units will be commissioned between 2003 and 2006 subject to a review in 1999. All will be fuelled by natural gas piped from the Yacheng 13-1 gas field off Hainan Island in China.
The associated transmission and distribution systems are wholly owned by CLP. Its transmission system operates at 400kV, 132kV and 66kV, and distribution is effected mainly at 33kV, 11kV and 380 volts.
The CLP and HEC transmission systems are interconnected by a cross-harbour link. This provides emergency back-up and achieves cost savings to consumers through economic energy transfers between the two systems and a reduction in the amount of generating capacity that needs to be kept as spinning reserve against the tripping of other units. The interconnection, commissioned in 1981, has a capacity of 720 MVA.
CLP's system is also interconnected with that of the Guangdong Electric Power Holding Company (formerly named the Guangdong General Power Company) of China and electricity is exported to Guangdong Province. Such sales are made from existing reserve generating capacity and are governed by an agreement with the government, signed in March 1992, under which CLP's consumers receive priority of supply and 80 per cent of the profit from the sales.
CLP has a contract with the China Merchants Steam Navigation Company Limited for the supply of electricity, for 20 years starting from late 1986, to the industrial zone of Shekou and the adjacent Chi Wan area, both in Guangdong. The arrangements, which afford Shekou a reliable electricity supply without subsidy from Hong Kong consumers, is illustrative of the close co-operation on energy matters which has developed between Guangdong and Hong Kong.