LAND, PUBLIC WORKS AND UTILITIES
Electricity
The Hongkong Electric Company Limited (HEC) supplies Hong Kong Island and the neighbouring islands of Ap Lei Chau and Lamma; CLP Power Hong Kong Limited (CLP Power) supplies Kowloon and the New Territories, including Lantau and several outlying islands. The supply to consumers is at 50Hz alternating current while the voltage is 220 volts single-phase and 380 volts three-phase.
The two supply companies are investor-owned. The Government monitors their performance through mutually agreed Scheme of Control Agreements. Current agreements with CLP Power and HEC came into effect on October 1, 1993 and January 1, 1994, respectively. Both will last for 15 years. The first five-yearly interim. review was completed in early 1999. The next review will be carried out in 2003. The agreements require each company to seek the approval of the Government for certain aspects of their financial plans, including projected tariff levels. The agreements do not grant the companies any exclusive rights. They are not franchises, nor do they define a supply area for either company or exclude new entrants to the market.
Electricity for HEC's supply areas is supplied from the Lamma Power Station. At the end of 2001, total installed capacity (i.e. rated power output of generators) at the Lamma Power Station was 3 305 megawatts (MW). In May 2000, the Government approved HEC's new power station at the Lamma Extension and the installation of the first 300MW gas combined-cycle generator there. The unit is scheduled to be commissioned in 2004, HEC's transmission system operates at 275 kilovolts (kV), 132kV and 66kV and distribution is effected mainly at 11kV and 380 volts.
The Castle Peak Power Company Limited (CAPCO), which is 60 per cent owned by ExxonMobil Energy Limited (formerly known as Exxon Energy Limited) and 40 per cent by CLP Power, supplies electricity to CLP Power from its Black Point (1 875MW), Castle Peak (4 108MW) and Penny's Bay (300MW) power stations, with the total installed capacity being 6 283MW. Two more 312.5MW generators are scheduled to be commissioned at the Black Point power station during 2005-06.
The associated transmission and distribution systems are wholly owned by CLP Power. Its transmission system operates at 400kV, 132kV and 66kV, and distribution is effected mainly at 33kV, 11kV and 380 volts.
The CLP Power 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, currently has a total capacity of 720 megavolt-amperes (MVA) (i.e. 720 000 kilovolt-amperes (kVA)).
CLP Power's system is also interconnected with that of the Guangdong Electric Power Holding Company (formerly named the Guangdong General Power Company) in the Mainland 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 Power's consumers receive priority of supply and 80 per cent of the profit from the sales.
In 1985, the Hong Kong Nuclear Investment Company (a wholly-owned subsidiary of the CLP Holdings Limited) and the Guangdong Nuclear Investment Company (wholly owned by the Chinese Ministry of Nuclear Industry) established the
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