The Zhitong Finance App learned that recently, Xinyi Energy (03868) released the “2023 Environmental, Social and Governance Report”. This report is Xinyi Energy's fifth ESG report, showing the group's sustainable development performance for the period from January 1 to December 31, 2023.

Xinyi Energy was listed on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on May 28, 2019, stock code: 03868.HK. The group is headquartered in Wuhu City, Anhui Province. Its business is mainly to sell electricity from its solar power plants to state-owned grid companies and provide services for operation, maintenance and management of solar power plants. It has become a leading pure solar power plant owner and operator based in China.

According to the ESG report, Xinyi Energy's sustainable development governance adopts a top-down strategic approach. The board of directors is fully responsible for overseeing the Group's sustainable development issues, evaluating and managing major environmental and social risks, and incorporating them into the Group's strategic considerations. At the same time, the Group attaches great importance to establishing and maintaining good communication with stakeholders.

Supply green electricity and promote energy transformation

Xinyi Energy mainly supplies green electricity through electricity sales to power grids, and actively participated in green power transactions in places such as Anhui, Guangdong, and Shaanxi during the year to promote energy transformation and the achievement of dual carbon goals. During the reporting period, Xinyi Energy added 636.5 MW large-scale solar power plant projects, driving a year-on-year increase of about 22.6% in total approved capacity and 3,821.4 gigawatt-hours of electricity sales, an increase of about 20.0% over the same period in 2022.

Due to the continuous increase in the scale of operations, the Group recorded increases in total energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, air pollutant emissions and waste emissions during the year. However, due to intelligent operation and maintenance management improving operation and maintenance efficiency and power generation efficiency, the energy and water consumption intensity and greenhouse gas emission intensity all declined, decreasing by 1.6%, 20.2% and 32.8% to 8,670 kilowatt-hours, 4.22 cubic meters and 4.86 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, respectively.

In addition, Xinyi Energy attaches importance to environmental management compliance in the solar power plant project development process and the protection of local ecological environment and biological resources, and is actively seeking partners that uphold the same concept of sustainable development. Of the 636.5 MW power plants added by the group during the reporting period, 70.7% were agricultural and optical complementary power plants, and 29.3% were fishuguang complementary power plants. By the end of 2023, 67.0% of the projects currently held by the group were agricultural and light complementary/floating power plants. While making full use of land and water resources, they had a positive impact on protecting the local ecological environment and halting the loss of biodiversity.

Ensure operational safety, pay attention to employee safety and training

In 2023, Xinyi Energy had a total staff team of 385 people, mainly technical talents such as electrical engineers, electricians, quality engineers, quality management specialists, etc., with 311 frontline operation and maintenance personnel, accounting for about 81% of the group's total employees.

The group has formulated a “Safety Management System” and established a production safety management system, implemented a “one job, one responsibility”, implemented the duties of all employees on production safety, continuously improved the production safety system, strived to provide a safe and reliable working environment for employees, and achieve annual and medium- to long-term production safety goals.

During the reporting period, Xinyi Energy provided employees with a variety of comprehensive skills training, including vocational skills training, personal growth training, safety training, anti-corruption training, and flexible selection of theoretical training and/or practical training, online/offline training, internal training/outsourced training from external professional institutions (“outsourced training”) according to the different training content. A total of 7,112 hours of training were arranged, with a total of 1,624 participants. The training time per employee was approximately 18.5 hours. Among them, the company's internal training was 1,610 hours, safety training was 826 hours, and outsourced training was 5,502 hours. Compared with 63.2% in 2022, the proportion of outsourced training increased to 77.4%.

Assume social responsibility and promote local economic development

Xinyi Energy has set up the Xinyi Education Fund to provide education funds for eligible employees' children to complete their studies; it also actively participated in local public welfare activities, such as the Qingyang Power Station organization to pay tribute to the lonely elderly, poor households, and left-behind children in Dingqiao Village and Luojiatan Village. During the reporting period, the Group distributed a total of RMB 28,000 in education funds to benefit 7 employees' children, and donated HK$5.841 million to the community.

Furthermore, Xinyi Energy favors the acquisition of power plant types with a “photovoltaic +” model to promote the integrated development of photovoltaic power generation with agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery industries, etc., and utilize spatial resources such as coal mining collapsed areas, fish farming, and agricultural greenhouses according to local conditions, not only to protect the local ecological environment and biological resources, but also to drive local employment and increase fiscal taxation.

Looking forward to the future, Xinyi Energy stated that it will work hand in hand with all stakeholders to continue to implement Xinyi Energy's core values, adhere to corporate environmental and social responsibilities, and unswervingly create long-term sustainable value for stakeholders.

(Link ESG researcher Deng Shixia)