TAIPEI (TVBS News) — Taiwan's cement industry is joining the island's push for grid stability, with Asia Cement Corporation (亞洲水泥) announcing last week it has integrated into a Virtual Power Plant (VPP, 虛擬電廠) that allows industrial facilities to reduce electricity consumption during periods of high demand.
The partnership with Enel X Taiwan (義電智慧能源台灣), a subsidiary of Italian energy giant Enel Group (義大利國家電力公司), enables Asia Cement's Hualien Plant to provide ancillary services to Taiwan Power Company's (台電) Energy Trading Platform. The company's Hsinchu Plant will also participate, though no timeline has been disclosed.
The Hualien facility aims to reduce power consumption by up to 30 megawatts within 30 minutes when the grid is under stress, according to the companies. That reduction equals the peak-time electricity usage of 15,000 households, or approximately 11.2% of all households in Hualien City, though the methodology behind these calculations was not provided.
Asia Cement will use its raw meal and cement grinding equipment to make the adjustments, leveraging production scheduling flexibility and raw material storage buffers to reduce load without disrupting operations.
The partnership comes as rising artificial intelligence applications and industrial electrification drive global energy demand higher, straining existing infrastructure. Wei-Ting Chen (陳威廷), chairman of Enel X Taiwan, said virtual power plants offer "faster, more agile, and cost-effective solutions" to strengthen grid resilience.
Enel X Taiwan has operated in the market since 2017 and now manages nearly 270 megawatts of demand response capacity across more than 160 commercial and industrial customers at 200 sites, making it Taiwan's largest demand response aggregator. The company's clients span semiconductors, chemicals, healthcare, data centers, steel, hospitality and retail sectors. ◼