Gas to fire Duqm power plant

By V L Srinivasan

Muscat, Feb 7: Apparently bowing to pressure from various sections, plans to run the 1,000MW independent power plant at Duqm in the Al Wusta region on coal have been shelved.

Instead, developers of the project will be supplied with natural gas that runs the 12existing and upcoming power plants in the country. The Ministry of Oil and Natural Gas has expressed its readiness to supply natural gas for the Duqm project and negotiations in this regard will take place at a later stage.

“We have decided to opt for natural gas, instead of coal, for the project. While the project cost is yet to be finalised, it can be more than RO1.5bn,” sources told Muscat Daily.

Sources also said that Duqm will be a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plant, as it would be more efficient and generate additional power, compared to an open cycle gas turbine (OCGT) plant. A CCGT plant has an average thermal efficiency of 49 per cent while it is only 30 per cent for OCGT plants, said an official.

The Duqm project is expected to meet the requirements of the scores of industries coming up along with a new port in the Al Wusta region. “Use of coal as raw material for the Duqm project would have helped reduce costs by six times. Besides, it was also one of the pilot projects to achieve a measure of fuel diversification,” sources said.

The decision against coal was taken reportedly under intense pressure from the public, including elected representatives, who expressed reservations about the project at the seminar ‘Using coal for power generation in Oman’ last fortnight.

They contended that a coalfired project would not only emit toxic gases into the atmosphere but also produce tonnes of residual ash.