On October 16th, on the eve of the third "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum, UE and Uzbekistan successfully signed a 500MW-wind-power-project power purchase agreement (PPA). According to the agreement, the two sides will price in RMB. The signing of this agreement marks an important step for UE to explore RMB cross-border trade settlement in Uzbekistan.

The PPA shows that UE will invest and construct a wind power project with a total scale of 500MW in Samarkand Oblast, Uzbekistan. It is expected to start by the end of 2023 and can be completed and connected to the grid by 2026. The purchase and sale period of electricity is 25 years. The project will be built into the first mountainous wind power plant in Central Asia.

It is worth noting that the PPA agreement stipulates that the purchase and sale of electricity for the project will be priced in RMB. This means from project financing, equipment procurement to electricity pricing, all aspects can achieve closed-loop transactions of RMB throughout the entire process, achieving new breakthroughs in the internationalization of RMB.

Nan Yi, Chairman of UE, stated that using RMB for pricing can avoid the risks caused by exchange rate fluctuations, reduce costs, and also facilitate the provision of more affordable green electricity to Uzbekistan. More importantly, it will be a beneficial attempt for Chinese enterprises to go global and promote RMB internationalization in various sub sectors.