Tag Archives: hydro

Tajik President travels to Pakistan for trade talks

NOV. 12 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajik president Emomali Rakhmon travelled to Islamabad for a two-day visit that will culminate with talks with Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif on plans to create a regional power market.

Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan hope to supply Pakistan and Afghanistan with power generated by their hydropower stations in a project dubbed CASA- 1000. The project is viewed as vital for increasing trade and diplomatic links between the neighbours.

And CASA-1000 already appears to be having a positive impact on relations between Tajikistan and its neighbours. This trip to Pakistan, will be Mr Rakhmon’s sixth.

An official at the Tajik embassy in Islamabad also said that wider trade relations would be discussed.

“During the Tajik president’s visit, they will discuss energy import, transit trade and linking the region through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which will bring prosperity in the entire area,” the unnamed official told the Express Tribune newspaper.

Electricity is one of Tajikistan’s and Kyrgyzstan’s main exports. Pakistan and Afghanistan are deficient in electricity.

Tajikistan and Pakistan don’t share a land border. A sliver of Afghanistan separates the countries.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)

Karapetyan now targets Armenia’s power stations

YEREVAN, OCT. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — After buying Armenia’s electricity network last week, the Russia-based Tashir Group is on the brink of buying the Hrazdan thermal power station, one of the country’s biggest and most important electricity generating plants.

The Armenian Public Services Regulatory Commission said it approved a deal for Tashir, which is owned by Armenian businessman Samvel Karapetyan, to buy Hrazdan from Russia’s Inter RAO. Inter RAO also sold the electricity network to Tashir.

After a summer of popular protests against electricity price increases that Inter RAO had wanted to impose, Tashir Group, which has a large property portfolio, will now dominate the Armenian electricity sector.

Mr Karapetyan, who is based in Moscow and is one of the richest men in Russia, is the brother of Karen, a member of the Armenian parliament.

The Armenian government backed the deals involving Tashir Group, although details have not yet been disclosed.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 251, published on Oct. 9 2015)

Samsung suspends building work at essential Kazakh power plant

ALMATY, SEPT. 23 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Korea-based Samsung Engineering said it was suspending construction work at a 1,320 megawatt coal-fired power plant near Lake Balkhash in Kazakhstan due to financing issues, throwing into doubt the feasibility of the $2.2b project that the Kazakh government has said is vital to meet growing demand for electricity.

Alluding to the impact of an economic downturn that has hit the economies and currencies of Central Asia, Samsung Engineering said it was worried that Kazakhstan couldn’t guarantee it would buy the power that the plant was due to generate.

“Samsung Engineering has been forced to temporarily halt the operation of the project because of an issue with the Kazakhstan government over the guaranteed purchase of the power to be produced from the project,” the company’s CEO Park Jung-heum told The Korea Times. He didn’t say when the project might resume.

The Kazakh government has not commented.

A consortium led by Samsung Engineering and Korean Electric Power Corp. won the project tender in 2009. The project was due to be completed in 2020 and would have supplied 9% of Kazakhstan’s total electricity demand.

The power plant was due to cost $2.2b to build. Korean Eximbank and Korea Trade Insurance Corp. pledged additional loans of around $3.5b.

In August, Samsung also said it was worried about the strength of Kazakhstan’s banking sector which is saddled with a large amount of bad debt, a legacy of the 2008/9 Global Financial Crisis.

Kazakhstan needs to increase its electricity generation capacity to power its export-oriented industrial sector and to feed its increasingly energy hungry population or face the prospect of black-outs. World Bank data showed that in 2014, Kazakhstan consumed around 88b kilowatt hours of electricity. In 2000, it consumed 48b kilowatt hours, figures that highlight the growth in demand.

Samsung’s decision to halt its big project at Balkhash is a serious setback for Kazakhstan’s energy plans.

It is also a litmus test for Kazakhstan’s ability to follow through with major infrastructure projects it planned during a period of high oil prices and steady export revenues.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Georgia expects power investment

OCT. 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia expects investments in its energy sector of $8b over the next few years, media quoted a Reuters interview with Ilia Beroshvili, Georgia’s deputy energy minister. Mr Beroshvili said that most of the investment would be in gas processing plants and hydropower.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 253, published on Oct. 23 2015)

Salini Impregilo wins $575m Georgia hydropower project

AUG. 31 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Korean Water Resource Corporation (K-Water) awarded Italian engineering group Salini Impregilo a contract worth $575m to build the Nenskra hydroelectric power plant (HPP) in the Svaneti region of northwest Georgia.

K-Water, in partnership with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation and the Korean Exim Bank, are developing the 280MW project which will have an overall cost of around $1b.

Salini Impregilo has already worked in Georgia on various projects, including the construction of a new motorway.

“The work will have to be completed in 62 months from the signing of the contract,” Salini Impregilo said in a statement.

“The Project will be composed of a main dam, a weir on the Nakra river, a transfer tunnel, a headrace tunnel to the powerhouse and the actual open-air powerhouse with four vertical-axis Pelton turbines.”

The Nenskra HPP project has been talked of for a few years. The Chinese Sinohydro had been selected to develop a 210MW project in 2012, only to withdraw later. Both the cost and the capacity of the HPP have been increased since 2012.

Irakli Kovzanadze, CEO of Partnership Fund, which controls stakes in major Georgian infrastructure projects for the state, underlined the importance of the project for Georgia.

“This hydropower plant will be the largest one in Georgia since the country’s independence,” Georgian media quoted him as saying.

Georgia produces three-quarters of its electricity from hydroelectric plants, although it still imports more than it produces.

One of the key strategic aims of the Nenskra HPP is to help Georgia reduce its energy dependence on Russia, which supplies it with most of its gas.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 246, published on Sept. 4 2015)

Kyrgyzstan opens new power transit line

AUG. 28 2015, BISHKEK (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan inaugurated a 450km-long electricity line that the government said would secure an independent power supply.

Kyrgyz president Almazbek Atambayev called it a “historic event,” as it would release Kyrgyzstan from depending on neighbouring countries for the transit of its own power.

“Everyone knows that electricity from the Toktogul dam was transmitted through Uzbekistan. We have paid millions of US dollars for that,” President Atambayev said.

The Datka-Kemin power line links the south of the country to the north, avoiding Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

The old Soviet-era power grid forced Kyrgyz-generated power in the south to enter the territory of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan before re-entering Kyrgyzstan. This added costs of around $9m, according to the latest estimates, without accounting for the loss of electricity from covering the extra distance.

“Thanks to Datka-Kemin PTL, Kyrgyzstan can annually save around $8-9m,” the Chairman of National Electric Network of Kyrgyzstan Bekbo Mamatbekov said in an interview for 24.kg.

Kyryzstan paid for the power line with a $390 loan from the Import- Export Bank of China. Construction took three years.

Over the past few months, the Kyrgyz government has been forced to increase electricity prices due to a regional economic downturn. The Datka-Kemin power line should reduce utility bills for the population.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 246, published on Sept. 4 2015)

Armenia to subsidise power

AUG. 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s government will use cash generated by the $180m sale of the Vorotan Hydro Cascade hydropower plant earlier this year to subsidise a 16% increase in power prices, media quoted PM Hovik Abrahamian as saying. The announcement appears to be a climbdown as the power price rise had sparked protests.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 242, published on August 7 2015)

Norwegian company buys Georgian hydropower plant

JULY 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Enguri hydropower plant in Georgia sold 400,000 carbon credits to Statkraft, a Norwegian electricity company, media reported. The deal highlights the progress Enguri has made in becoming more professional. It is the largest power plant in Georgia, generating 40% of its electricity.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 240, published on July 16 2015)

Tajik electricity exports rise

JUNE 25 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan increased exports of electricity to Afghanistan by a third in May compared to the same month in 2014, media reported quoting official statistics. This is important because international backers view Tajiksitan’s hydro-generated electricity as a decent export.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 237, published on June 25 2015)

US investors to manage Armenia’s Vorotan HPP

JUNE 17 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – US-based Contour Global Hydro Cascade formally received a 25-year licence to produce electricity at the Vorotan hydropower plants from Armenia’s state regulator. Although a formality, the licence is significant as Vorotan produces around 15% of Armenia’s electricity.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 236, published on June 18 2015)