Mumbai: The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations has agreed to form a regional ASEAN power grid. This will serve as a platform for members to trade electricity under a set of harmonised technical rules and regulations.

ASEAN leaders are also scheduled to sign a plan of action in the next two months in Singapore to put a $7-billion Trans ASEAN Gas Pipeline (TAGP) project back on track, Indonesia''s energy minister said. ASEAN will also work closely with the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to keep prices in check.

Individual governments will set the gas transmission fees for the use of pipeline sections located within their national territory, with the range being dependent on the volume of gas being delivered and the economic value of the gas.

"Although gas sales will be based on business-to-business agreements, governments, as the regulators, will take part in laying the legal foundation that will provide clarity for the implementation of the project," Indonesia''s energy and mineral resources minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro said.

He said that the action plan envisaged the issuance of rules to resolve border issues between the ASEAN member countries whose borders would be traversed by the gas pipelines.

Energy ministers of ASEAN countries have also pledged to strengthen a regional partnership to achieve a minimum 10 per cent renewable energy use by 2010. The meeting endorsed a memorandum of understanding for a regional power network.

"ASEAN will also set up a working group to study the safety issue of nuclear power plants, which may form part of long-term energy planning for individual countries," Thai minister of energy Piyasvasti Amaranand told an ASEAN energy ministers` conference.

"Reliable, affordable supplies are essential for Asia''s continued growth and ASEAN is no exception," Singapore deputy prime minister and coordinating minister for national security S. Jayakumar said.

"As one of the world''s fastest growing region, ASEAN will require increasing energy supplies to fuel our rapid pace of economic expansion," he said in an opening speech at the ASEAN ministers'' energy meeting.

Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand have announced plans to tap nuclear energy, but environmental activists have warned about risks, as the region does not have the expertise to operate such plants and deal with nuclear waste.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

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