POWER September 2016 - 26

TOP PLANTS
Attaqa Power Plant, Suez City,
Egypt
Owner/operator: East Delta Electricity Production Co.
Courtesy: Rowad Modern Engineering
To alleviate chronic power shortages, the first gas turbine unit at this fast-tracked
640-MW plant was synchronized to the grid within a record-breaking 159 days-two
days ahead of schedule.
Sonal Patel
T
he revolution in 2011 that ousted
Egypt's former president, Mohamed
Morsi, shattered the country's economy,
and the years of political transition that
followed, paired with a recent bulge in its
population growth rate, have overstretched
Egypt's infrastructure as well as its social
services and environment. Particularly affected
was its power sector, which was steeped
in turmoil.
The country has suffered rolling blackouts,
struggling to balance a sharp rise in
electricity demand with inadequate generation,
which was compounded by natural gas
shortages, aging infrastructure, deficient
transmission capacity, and unprofitable
power pricing. But in 2014, in an attempt
to bridge the chasm between power demand
and supply, the government began to take
urgent measures to scale up infrastructure
spending to alleviate what had become a
crippling electricity crisis.
26
First, it moved to liberalize energy
prices and eliminate all subsidies by 2018.
Then it paved the way for private companies
to engage in power generation, a field
dominated by government entities. It also
rolled out a new energy strategy, calling
for ambitious targets to boost its generating
capacity to add 54 GW to its 2015 total
installed capacity of 31.34 GW by 2022. In
addition, the country sought to diversify its
power supplies, outlining plans for 21 GW
of new capacity from liquefied natural gas
and other gas-fired plants, 12.5 GW from
coal plants, 2 to 4 GW of new nuclear capacity,
and more than 13 GW from renewables.
And, to mitigate a more imminent
power crunch, the government also issued a
" fast-track " generation plan to add 3.6 MW
before demand surged during the summer
of 2015.
Finally, it signed major contracts worth an
estimated $65 billion for new generation and
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transmission upgrades, creating memorandums
of understanding with Egyptian firms
and multinational companies-among them,
Elsewedy Electric, Siemens, ACWA Power,
Dana Gas, Eni, British Petroleum, and China
State Grid.
A Fast-Track Project
The Egyptian
Electricity Holding Co.
(EEHC), a state-owned entity operating
under the Egyptian Ministry of Electricity
and Renewable Energy, awarded Elsewedy
Electric, a Cairo-headquarted manufacturing
conglomerate, one of those lucrative
" fast-track " contracts in December 2014.
Valued at an estimated $706 million, the
contract demanded the construction of two
" high priority " gas-fired power projects
within a tight, six-month timeframe: a 640MW
power plant in Attaqa, near Suez City,
with four simple cycle SGT-2000E Siemens
gas turbines and a 330-MW simple cycle
POWER | September 2016
http://www.powermag.com
POWER September 2016

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