China Stands to Gain Most From Southeast Asia's $200 Billion Power Buildout
A Bain and Standard Chartered report projects more than 100 TWh of new demand in Southeast Asia by 2030, with China positioned to supply the bulk of the hardware.
Southeast Asia's appetite for power is about to outrun its grids. Data centres, electric vehicles and green industrial parks will add more than 100 terawatt-hours of incremental electricity demand across the region by 2030, according to the 2026 Southeast Asia Green Economy Report published by Bain & Company and Standard Chartered in May 2026.1
Meeting that demand will require more than $200 billion in investment, Bain and Standard Chartered estimated, with the largest share — more than half — flowing into data centres, as operators in Singapore, Thailand and elsewhere race to secure grid connections ahead of competitors.3,1
The beneficiary most conspicuously absent from Southeast Asian boardroom conversations is China. With more than 70% of global production of solar raw materials, cells and assembled modules concentrated inside its borders, Chinese manufacturers are positioned to capture a disproportionate share of the hardware orders the region's green transition will generate, according to the Economist, citing Gavekal Dragonomics analyst Dan Wang.4
That supply dominance was not accidental. Years of state-directed capacity expansion left Chinese manufacturers with cost structures that regional competitors cannot match, and Dan Wang assessed China's lead in solar technology as likely irreversible.4
The scale of the opportunity in data centres alone is significant. Wood Mackenzie projected that data centre power demand in Southeast Asia will quadruple from 2.6 gigawatts to 10.7 gigawatts between 2025 and 2035, rising from 1% of regional peak demand in 2025 to 3-4% by 2035.5 JKM Asian LNG front-month traded at $16.57 on Friday (2026-07-10), reflecting demand from the same industrial corridors now accelerating their electricity buildout.
But the transition is not proceeding at the pace green-investment tallies imply. Around 50% to 60% of renewable energy projects in Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia have been cancelled over the past five years, hobbled by regulatory uncertainty, permitting delays and grid capacity limits, Bain and Standard Chartered found.2 Of roughly $540 billion in announced green investments across the region's power and electric vehicle supply chains, only around 60% is considered likely to proceed under current market conditions.2
The green economy itself is growing regardless. Southeast Asia's green economy was valued at $290 billion in the report and was projected to expand to $430 billion by 2030, reflecting investment across clean energy and low-carbon industries.2 But grid bottlenecks remain the principal constraint. Power demand from data centres, EVs and industrial parks will grow regardless of policy timelines, but the transmission and distribution infrastructure required to carry it is developing more slowly, OilPrice.com reported in May 2026 (2026-05-19), citing the same Bain analysis.7
Thailand and Vietnam present a particular variant of this problem. EV adoption is accelerating rapidly in both markets, alongside Indonesia, straining distribution networks not designed for concentrated charging loads.6 The green industrial park model — clusters of certified manufacturers attracting foreign direct investment — needs reliable baseload power, which intermittent renewable capacity cannot readily provide without storage or dispatchable backup.6
The strategic consequence is that Southeast Asia's green ambitions are likely to widen rather than narrow the region's dependence on Chinese manufactured goods. Solar panels and battery packs manufactured in China will underpin the generation and storage layer. The $200 billion investment figure circulates as a Southeast Asian opportunity; the supply chain arithmetic suggests a substantial portion resolves in Shenzhen and Xinjiang.2,4
Seventy-seven percent of policymakers and business leaders surveyed across Southeast Asia named China as the most influential economic power in the region, according to a survey published earlier this year.4 Watch whether Vietnam or Thailand can use procurement conditions on state-backed renewable contracts to shift any meaningful module or cell manufacturing onshore — that is the only lever that would alter the supply-chain windfall flowing to Beijing.