SEA nations eye 11 new cross-border power connections

SINGAPORE (AP) - Southeast Asian nations will consider 11 new power grid projects as a step to increase the region's cross-border electricity connections, an ASEAN group official said Wednesday.

The proposals will be made Thursday by the Centre for Energy of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, said Khoo Chin Hean, chief executive of Singapore's Energy Market Authority.

"I understand a draft (memorandum of understanding) is being considered," he said at a task force meeting ahead of Thursday's 25th ASEAN Ministers on Energy Meeting in Singapore. Many of the connections would be for links within the Indochina region.

ASEAN comprises the 10 countries of Southeast Asia: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

The bloc currently has just two cross-border power connections: between Thailand and Malaysia and between Malaysia and Singapore.

The ASEAN Centre for Energy has been eyeing a regional power grid as well as a "trans-ASEAN" gas pipeline for several years.

Khoo said the Jakarta-based Centre for Energy has also identified seven new natural-gas pipeline projects for possible development _ part of a long-held blueprint to strengthen the region's energy security.