Ratchaburi Power Plants Thailand

Construction is underway on a new 1400MW combined cycle unit at Ratchaburi southwest of Bangkok Thailand The project adds to the existing Ratchaburi plant already the largest in Thailand The commercial operations of the first new 700MW unit began in March 2008 while the operations of Unit 2 began in June 2008 The Ratchaburi project is owned by the Ratchaburi Electricity Generating Co Ltd Ratchgen The two existing plants supply a total of 3645MW at Ratchaburi located in 875 acres of the Navaratchaburirom Park by the Mae Klong River One plant has three 600MW combinedcycle units and the other has two 700MW conventional dual oil and gas fuel thermal plants There is the option of burning natural gas diesel and bunker oil to avoid dependence solely on gas imported from the new Yadana gas field in Myanmar Ratchaburi is EGATs Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand largest single investment The first gas turbine was finally started at the end of 1999 and another thermal unit in 2001 The plant was producing 2125MW by 2002 The delayed start was attributed to late delivery of some GE equipment and to incorrect specifications for the gas burner It is understood that the burners had to be modified to accommodate the lower than expected calorific value of the Yadana gas The modifications were required to ensure good combustion efficiency and lower fuel consumption In 1998 EGAT temporarily transferred a gas turbine unit from the Lan Krabue Power Plant to Ratchaburi to help the Petroleum Authority of Thailand PTT avoid being fined by the Myanmar gas supplier The new units were originally planned for completion in 2001 In February 2004 Hongkong Electric Holdings Limited HEH announced that its whollyowned subsidiary Hongkong Electric International Limited HEI had finalised shareholding arrangements with five other shareholders for the 1400MW expansion Emerson Process Management won a contract to install its PlantWebdigital plant architecture with Ovation expert control system and Foundation fieldbus at the Ratchaburi extension Emersons system will monitor and control the heat recovery steam generators as well as balance of plant processes The Ovation system will also interface via TCPIP to the MHI governor system which controls the gas and steam turbines Emersons equipment has a total of 13 redundant controllers eight Ovation workstations AMSTM Suite Intelligent Device Manager and 40 Rosemount 848T intelligent temperature devices Electricity generated by the plant will be sold to the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand under a 25year Power Purchase Agreement The Ratchaburi plant is well placed to supply the Bangkok area which accounts for half of the countrys total electricity demand It is situated 100km from Bangkok and is the main power plant on the western side of the country Power plants in the east are liable to transmission line congestion Under the governments new policy this made Ratchaburi a prime candidate for privatisation with an estimated selling price of 56719m baht GEMitsui consortium won combinedcycle order A GEMitsui consortium won the combinedcycle main equipment order worth around 450m Their lead subcontractor is Raytheon which provided engineering services Price was reportedly the key criterion Rivals for the order were Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Marubeni Siemens and ABB GE supplied turbines and generators while Mitsui managed procurement for supporting equipment Mitsui also managed countertrade operations with its trading system Countertrade involves required purchases of Thai goods to lower the foreign exchange outflow for equipment The order was a significant milestone for Mitsui which has increased its commitment to the power sector outside Japan Mitsubishi Heavy Industries won the order for the conventional thermal plant again on price It supplied steam turbines generators and other equipment for around 500m Rivals for the business were Mitsui Siemens ABB Nichimen and Sumitomo The ExportImport Bank of Japan Jexim guaranteed the foreign currency portion of the finance for the two Mitsubishisupplied conventional thermal generators Stone Webster provided design and oversight services for planning procurement and construction Elsag Bailey supplied process control systems for all units Its 20m contract included 70 operator stations three engineering workstations a strategic system to link plant and business information and two plant simulators Korean group Kolon Engineering provided water treatment systems The consortium of ABB Substations AB and ABB TD Ltd won the contract to supply and build a switchyard with 230 and 500kV capacity Hitachi and Sumitomo also won related 500kV transmission contracts Fuel for the Ratchaburi CCGT and possibly for the conventional plant comes from the Yadana gas field in the Andaman Sea off Myanmar although both plants can also use oil Energy groups Total of France and Unocal of the USA are partnering the Myanmar and Thai state oil groups in the construction of the offshore installations and a 415mile pipeline to transport gas to Ratchaburi Total lead investor Total was the lead investor with a 32 stake It operates the Myanmar side of the pipeline Unocal has 28 Petroleum Authority of Thailand PTT 25 and Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise 15 The Myanmar side of the project cost an estimated 1bn or more The Myanmar portion of the pipeline includes a 215mile subsea section and a 39mile onshore segment The pipeline from the Thai border to Ratchaburi stretches 161 miles and is the responsibility of PTT the gas purchaser Gas production can be as high as 650 million ft per day and will last 30 years Officially Thailand takes 81 of the total with Myanmar taking the remainder for new power and industrial projects Total and its partners are actively developing fields adjacent to Yadana In August 1999 the Ratchaburi power plant began to receive 55 million ft per day of the expected maximum 325 million ft per day gas supply from the Yadana field to run the first turbine As part of its conditions the International Monetary Fund IMF called for the complete restructuring of Thailands electricity industry EGAT was ordered to sell all its power stations except hydroelectric plant A private company Electricity Generating plc Egco was chosen to operate two gasfired power stations totalling 2100MW EGAT continues to own and operate Thailands national power transmission system and buys electricity from privatised and new private producers to supply to distributors and large customers Gasfired stations account for about half Thailands installed generating capacity and oilfired power plants account for a further 20 The kingdoms remaining power capacity is provided by various hydroelectric and lignitefired schemes Get industry leading news data and analysis delivered to your inbox

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