KARACHI – The 232 megawatts (MW) ship-mounted rental power plants (RPPs) that arrived in Karachi in November 2010 are expected to start power generation for the national grid this month.
Interestingly, despite being anchored in Karachi, the power generated by the RPPs would not benefit the load shedding-hit commercial and industrial hub of the country, as they are a project of Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) and the supply from the plants would be diverted to the national grid.
However, according to sources in Karkey, the total capacity of the project is around 330MW with the contractual capacity of 232MW and the additional 98MW of electricity could be supplied to the Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) or the city’s industrial sector.
The RPPs have started test operations after completing installation work and are all set to supply around 232MW to the WAPDA by the end of this month, as the Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO) has completed the procedural connectivity requirements, well-placed sources told Pakistan Today on Saturday.
While the demand for electricity has started increasing after a change in weather across the country, the addition of power to the national grid would certainly lower the shortfall. Earlier, the Turkish company, Karkey, which owns the ship, had dispatched net 110MW electricity on January 29 as an initial batch, but it had to wait for the completion of administrative procedures related to PEPCO and other relevant authorities for generating at full capacity.
While waiting for clearance from various government authorities, Karkey had offered delivering electricity from the already-commissioned parts of the power-generating ship only for its fuel costs. The project is expected to save up to Rs 6 billion per year on fuel transport costs and curbing transmission line losses while providing additional generation capacity to the national grid.
This power-generating ship, Kaya Bey, had arrived Karachi on November 17, 2010 while another ship ‘Alican Bey’ carrying 110MW power plants also reached Karachi to add to the capacity to the project. The sources said that the world’s largest ship-mounted RPPs project has been facing continuous delays even after the installation of 132kV interconnection line from Kaya Bey last year.
