TNB keen to expand in Europe
Published on: Friday, December 16, 2016
Kuala Lumpur: Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) is interested in expanding its business in Europe after setting its presence in Turkey through a 30 per cent equity purchase in GAMA Enerji AS for US$255 million (US$1=RM4.46).President/Chief Executive Officer Datuk Seri Ir Azman Mohd said Europe is seen as an attractive investment location due to the well-established regulatory framework in the region."There are very good investment opportunities in developed countries (Europe) because of their very disciplined and well-established legal and regulatory framework," he told reporters after the company's annual general meeting here Thursday.
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Apart from Europe, he said, TNB is aggressively expanding into regional markets, setting it eyes on Southeast Asia, South Asia and the Middle East."We are looking at investments that can give us almost a PPA (power purchase agreement)-like revenue growth," he said. He said the move to expand abroad is also to compensate for the declining electricity demand locally with the country moving towards energy savings and efficiency."We think that the electricity demand growth is going to go down.
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"Our reason for going overseas is to diversify our sources of earnings growth in the future by looking at countries that offer long-term sustainable growth and have much higher growth as compared to Malaysia," he said. He said TNB would also ensure that is has a balanced portfolio of countries with high growth and stable revenue.
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Azman said overseas expansion is also seen as a step forward in the company's bid to be one of the world's top 10 utility companies by market capitalisation by 2025.He said the company is targeting international investments to account for 20 per cent of its earnings by 2025. On the type of overseas investments, he said TNB would tend to look at a generation type of business whether conventional such as coal, gas and hydro or renewable such as wind and solar."We are looking at a whole suite of opportunities for investment, and those actually fit with our strategic objective and portfolio," he said.He added that the company also intends to increase renewable energy generation in its portfolio to enhance its reputation as a power player."As a power player, we need to build a meaningful portfolio of assets so it (renewable energy) is something we will be looking at as well," he said.Azman said TNB aspires to be the Asean leader in renewable energy with plans to invest domestically in solar, wind biomass, biogas and mini hydro projects.He said the company is in a good position to take advantage of the potential opportunities in renewable energy given the knowledge and expertise obtained from its various community grid solar projects, mini hydropower projects and the 5,777 renewable projects in Peninsular Malaysia in which TNB is the offtaker."TNB is taking active steps in pursuing its renewable energy goals including via 83 per cent-owned Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd (SESB) which has bid for the development of a 200 megawatt large-scale solar photovoltaic plant in Sabah and Labuan," he said. He added that the bid outcome is expected in January next year and TNB is optimistic that it would secure the project.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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