As work advances to connect the Karpowership to supply 36 megawatts of electricity to the national grid, the government is looking to acquire an additional 30 megawatts to support generation efforts.
The General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo, disclosed this during his weekly press conference at Freedom House on Thursday.
The general secretary told reporters that this will also help supplement the heightened demand until the Gas to Energy project comes on stream in 2025.
“We are still looking to see if we could get an additional 30 megawatts of power into the system in a similar arrangement to the one we have with Karpower,” Dr Jagdeo explained.
Already, GPL has paid a mobilisation fee of US$1 million to rent the 36 MW powership from Karpowership International, a Turkish company.
The utility has also confirmed that it will pay US 6.62 cents per kilowatt hour as a monthly charter fee for the powership and a maintenance fee of 0.98 US cents per kWh based on electricity generated.
“We are hoping that with the 36 megawatts added to the system, that we’d have enough power in the system to end the current state of blackouts which come from unavailability of power,” the GS said.
Not only would this additional power enable GPL to meet peak demand, but it would also allow for the maintenance of additional units.
Earlier today, GPL indicated that testing the engines, transformers, fuel, metering and telecommunication systems on the powership has been completed.
Final testing is underway, and once completed, the team will commence dispatching power from the powership to the grid.
The power will be injected into the DBIS incrementally, beginning with Berbice and continuing through the various load centres in Demerara.
Dr Jagdeo reminded that as peak demand stands at about 180 megawatts, the hallmark Gas to Energy project will supply another 300 megawatts, which will be more than enough to resolve the country’s electricity woes definitively.
“That is, by any standard, a massive injection of new power, and from a new power plant too. So we could then put all of these older units into reserves…maintain them and keep them in reserves,” he explained.