M Azizur Rahman

The government is now actively working to rehabilitate the country's aged power plants, now running at de-rated capacities, to augment electricity supplies, officials said Monday.

The power ministry has recently asked the state-owned Power Development Board (PDB) to provide necessary information including requirement of components and spares so that, once rehabilitated, the plants could produce electricity at their installed capacities, a senior power ministry official said.

The PDB subsequently wrote to the chiefs of the aged power plants to provide details of those power houses and what needs to be done for deriving full-capacity electricity generation from these plants.

Currently the country has five power plant units aged over 40 years, 11 units between ages of 31-40 years, 23 units between 21-30 years, 19 units between 11-20 years and 69 units between 1-10 years of age.

But the economic life of any power plant is usually 30 years, the power ministry official said.

The aged power plants consume more energy than the new ones, which has been threatening the country's energy security for long.

Among the aged power plants supplying electricity at de-rated capacities include - Rauzan power plant in Chittagong, Ghorashal power plant, Khulna power plant, Shahjibazar power plant, Barisal power plant, Baropukuria power plant, Ashuganj power plant, Westmont power plant, and Shidhhirganj power plant.

The Rauzan power plant has the installed capacity to generate 420 megawatts (mw) of electricity, while its de-rated capacity is 360mw but the plant is now generating only 270mw of electricity.

The installed capacity of Ghorashal power plant is 840 mw, its de-rated capacity is 760 but the plant is currently generating 670mw.