The U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) hosted an Orientation Visit (OV) to the United States for nine Vietnamese officials and one Commercial Specialist from the U.S. Foreign Commercial Service in Hanoi, Vietnam from January 20, 2005 to January 29, 2005. The purpose of the OV was to facilitate discussions between the Vietnamese delegates and U.S. companies, associations and government agencies regarding the development of environmental and project management standards for the Son La Hydropower Project in northwestern Vietnam.

Electricity of Vietnam (EVN) is developing this 2,400MW power generation and water resources management project as part of the Vietnamese government’s directive to expand power production capacity. Son La is a major component of the Vietnamese government’s energy strategy and one of the country’s largest public works projects. Planning for the project has already begun, and EVN expects to bring the facility online by 2016.

The OV, which was sponsored by USTDA and conducted by Global Marketing and Communications (GMC), included site visits to the Rocky Reach Hydropower Project on the Columbia River in Wenatchee, WA and the Hoover Dam. A USTDA Business Briefing was convened in Las Vegas, and the remainder of the visits focused on meetings in Washington, DC with U.S. Government Agencies, the World Bank, and private sector, project management and environmental engineering firms. The meetings were organized to help ensure that the Son La project is constructed and operated with minimal environmental and social consequences.