Up to 65 percent of work in the First Phase of Az-Zour Power Plant, a gas-fired combined cycle power and water plant located at Az-Zour, approximately 100 km south of Kuwait City, has been completed, Shamal Az-Zour Al-Oula company said on Monday.
Generating electricity is expected to start in June 2015.
Shamal Az-Zour Al-Oula for the Building, Execution, Operation, Management and Maintenance of the First Phase of Az-Zour Power Plant (K.S.C.) is a special purpose Project Company.
The power plant is being built as part of Az-Zour North Independent Water and Power Project (IWPP). The construction of the power plant along with a desalination plant forms the first phase of the Series of Independent Water and Power Project.
The integrated power and desalination plant is scheduled to be completed and commissioned by the fourth quarter of 2016.
The Plant will receive two more turbines as of June 2015, the company said in a press statement, adding that by last November up to seven million hours had been lavished at work. No single accident has been recorded in the project whose total costs hit USD 1.4 billion.
Last year, the company received five turbines, out of seven, each with 226 watt capacity. Three turbines were installed in 2014, it noted.
Up to 4,200 people are employed in the power plant whose engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor is Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI), while the EPC contractor for the desalination plant is Sidem.
The power plant is of 1,500 MW and the associated water desalination plant has a capacity of 107 million imperial gallons per day (486 thousand mآ³/day).
Sidem is working hard on the desalination units to be handed over this year. They are built abroad and transported here to be installed.
Az-Zour Power Plant is environment-friendly and will play a pivotal role for supporting development in Kuwait, producing up to 10 percent of the state power, the company stressed.
Source : KUNA Kuwait News agency
