425 MW Nandipur power plant still not fully functional

By Ahmad Ahmadani

The much touted Nandipur power plant has not been made fully functional as the appointed Chinese engineers have so far remained unable to restore complete operation, Pakistan Today learnt on Tuesday.

Officials of the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC), on the condition of anonymity, disclosed that a fault appeared sixty days ago during the annual inspection of the power plant, but so far the engineers have been unable to restore it to full operation. The performance of the plant has also been declining because of rusted machinery, they officials added.

“All efforts so far made to run the power plant at full capacity remained in vain. This power plant with Rs58billion cost has been termed as one of the most costly power plant constructed in the history of the country and became a major point of embarrassment for the ruling PML-N government,” informed sources said. They added that although the construction of the Nandipur power plant was completed during July last year, yet the much-talked 425 Mega Watt power plant could not generate electricity at full capacity.

“Monthly power generation from Nandipur power plant has decreased from 140 MW power to 21.8 MW of power,” an official disclosed, requesting not to be named. He added that the delay in the full operation of Nandipur power plant has so far caused a loss of more than Rs. 5 billion.

According to the agreement, a Chinese contractor was responsible for making the plant fully operational. However, it has so far not been made fully functional, which is a violation of  the agreement.

NEPRA has taken serious notice of the low power generation. Informed sources said that the Northern Power Generation Company Limited (NPGCL) in a review petition on the Nandipur Power Project with NEPRA had advocated that the project was likely to cause losses worth billions of Rupees to the national exchequer even if made operational at full capacity.

The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has also been investigating the sky-high increase in the cost of the Nandipur power plant and has sought documentary evidence regarding heavy payments to various contractors in the name of repairing of the plant’s machinery without following necessary tendering process.

It is worth mentioning here that Musharraf government had awarded the project, and the agreement for the Nandipur plant between the Pakistan government and a Chinese company was signed on January 28, 2008, when the country was under a caretaker setup. The Ministry of Water and Power has already communicated three major technical problems with the project, including the import of a low capacity furnace oil treatment plant, flaws in the long-term outsourcing contract for operation and maintenance, and the short-term contract awarded to engineering, procurement and construction contractors.