Chapter 460 - 210: A New Village Appears

Chapter 460: Chapter 210: A New Village Appears

"That’s a real shame," Gu Baoming said, deeply disappointed.

This was a common problem faced by many new energy companies. Power generation from wind and solar was too unstable, so the grid only allowed about 30% of it to be fed in. The rest of the electricity had to be either used by the company itself or go to waste.

But using this unstable electricity internally, even with regulating equipment and storage systems, still resulted in severe losses.

For an aquaculture company, it was slightly better. As long as the instability wasn’t too severe, it was barely acceptable.

However, for processing plants that required precision, they would absolutely stay far away from such an unstable power source.

Power generation companies produced a massive amount of electricity, but the grid’s feed-in quota was small.

The root cause was that the power from these new energy companies fluctuated too much. The grid didn’t dare to accept it all, or it would risk being paralyzed in minutes.

Currently, the only way to solve the grid connection problem for new energy generation was for the power companies themselves to set up energy storage systems. Only then could they achieve sustainable development.

If they simply waited for the power grid to solve the problem, the grid had only one response: limited feed-in.

For the grid, limiting the feed-in was the most cost-effective solution. After all, any wasted power was the new energy company’s loss, not the grid’s.

If the grid were to cover the losses for new energy companies, it would suffer immensely.

Moreover, thermal and hydroelectric power companies were also full of complaints about the new energy sector. Although there were capacity subsidies, thermal and hydro plants had to accommodate solar and wind power, which significantly reduced their annual effective generation time and drove up their unit cost of electricity.

In short, the only way out for new energy companies now was to build their own energy storage systems to guarantee the stability of their power supply. Only then would the grid be willing to accept it.

But many new energy companies were already heavily in debt. Forcing them to invest in energy storage systems was clearly a high-risk investment for many.

As a result, many new energy companies would rather endure wasting 70% of their generated power than spend money on building energy storage systems.

Take Seaview Company, for example.

When they first invested in the project, they thought that using the open land and water surfaces of the breeding farm to generate electricity and lower the water temperature would kill two birds with one stone.

But now, coming to his senses, Gu Haijing realized he had no idea when he would ever recoup the investment. This was especially true after the grid limited their feed-in quota, further extending their break-even period.

But a longer break-even period meant a skyrocketing risk.

After all, photovoltaic panels degrade over time, and their power generation efficiency would progressively decrease.

Furthermore, as time went on, the probability of encountering a typhoon also increased. If a solar farm was hit head-on by a typhoon, losses would be unavoidable.

Coming to his senses, Gu Haijing now saw that combining photovoltaic power with ecological aquaculture was a massive money pit.

If not for the fact that they had made a good amount of money following Hailufeng Company’s lead these past two years, Seaview Company would probably be facing operational problems.

Starting last year, Seaview Company had halted construction on its photovoltaic projects and instead refocused on deepening its aquaculture business, which finally reversed its previous state of loss.

Just as they were discussing the bleak future of photovoltaic power, Zhang Haitao suddenly received a call from Zhang Xincheng.

After finishing the call, Zhang Haitao came back and said directly to Gu Haijing and his son, "General Manager Gu, our company’s Vice General Manager Zhang is looking for you. You should head over to our headquarters. It should be good news."

"Good news? I’ll head over right away." A look of delight appeared on Gu Baoming’s face.

The more experienced Gu Haijing, however, asked, "Manager Zhang, may I ask which Vice General Manager Zhang?"

After all, Hailufeng Company had so many senior executives. Rushing over without clarifying would only cause more trouble later.

Zhang Haitao realized his oversight. "My apologies, I wasn’t clear. It’s Zhang Xincheng, the one in charge of the aquaculture division."

The moment he heard the name Zhang Xincheng, Gu Haijing understood. After bidding farewell to Zhang Haitao, he hurriedly took his son and rushed to Magong Town.

「Less than an hour later.」

The two cars carrying Gu Haijing and his son arrived at Little Nanshan, near the Cheung Sha Wan Highway Entrance, which was also the location of Hailufeng Company’s new headquarters.

After meeting with Zhang Xincheng, the two of them finally learned what it was all about.

"...So that’s how it is. No problem. I agree to the cooperation," Gu Haijing decided on the spot.

Zhang Xincheng extended his hand. "To a pleasant cooperation, then."

"To a pleasant cooperation. I must thank General Manager Zhang and General Manager Jiang for looking out for us," Gu Haijing said gratefully as he shook his hand.

Gu Baoming had no objections either.

Soon, the two parties signed a cooperation agreement.

The cooperation project involved Seaview Company bundling all the photovoltaic power generation equipment at its Lufeng Breeding Base to establish a joint photovoltaic power company with Hailufeng Company.

Seaview Company would own 90% of the new company’s shares, while Hailufeng Company would own 10%. However, Hailufeng Company would have controlling rights, and Seaview Company would retain rights of supervision and dividends.

This model was adopted specifically to bypass certain regulatory issues within the power system.

Therefore, the joint venture would nominally be a subsidiary of Hailufeng Company.

This way, the electricity generated by the new company could be used directly by Hailufeng Company without having to go through the power grid.

Seaview Company wouldn’t lose out either. Hailufeng Company’s large aquaculture base in Lufeng had a massive demand for electricity for its cooling systems, which could perfectly utilize Seaview Company’s surplus solar power. The internal electricity price was set at 0.15 yuan per kilowatt-hour.

Gu Haijing and his son were both willing to accept this price. After all, if they didn’t sell this solar power to Hailufeng Company, it would just be wasted anyway.

Of course, Hailufeng Company’s reason for this cooperation wasn’t simply to help Seaview Company.

Through this partnership, they could obtain cheap electricity and avoid the investment of building their own power generation facilities. Additionally, the two companies’ breeding bases in Lufeng were just a town apart, less than 30 kilometers from each other, making it entirely feasible to lay a dedicated power cable.

It was a win-win project.