OREANDA-NEWS.  Highlighting the continued demand by textile mills and other industrial customers in Pakistan for reliable on-site power and cooling solutions, GE’s (NYSE: GE) Distributed Power business today announced Tata Energy, a part of Tata Industries, has selected two of GE’s 3.3-megawatt (MW) Jenbacher J620 cogeneration gas engines to power Tata’s Salfi textile mills in Karachi, the country’s largest city. The project represents GE’s 1,000th and 1,001st Jenbacher gas engines to be installed in the country.

In addition to generating electricity, the Jenbacher units also will recover heat from the engine exhaust to produce steam for the mill’s production processes and also recover heat from the engine’s jacket water to produce chilled water to support cooling needs at the facility.

GE’s Jenbacher natural gas-fueled engines will enable Tata to reduce its on-site energy production costs, gain greater electrical efficiency of 43.5 percent and further improve overall efficiency of the power plant by making effective use of the engine exhaust heat and jacket water heat to align with the government’s goal of encouraging optimal use of cleaner natural gas for power and cooling production. Once Tata installs the new engines by August 2014, the company plans to retire its existing, less-efficient generator sets.

GE’s installed base of Jenbacher units in Pakistan have recorded more than 31 million hours of operation, reflecting the popularity of the engines for their reliability, durability and low emissions since the late 1990s.

With today’s milestone announcement, GE’s Jenbacher engines now supply approximately 873 MW to Pakistan’s textile industry. Across the country, Jenbacher engines generate a total of 1,445 MW to power some of the country’s major industries, including the energy, chemical and manufacturing sectors. Pakistan has one of the largest concentrations of Jenbacher engines compared to other countries around the world.

Commenting on the new project and milestone, Sarim Sheikh, president and CEO, GE Pakistan, said, “It is particularly gratifying to celebrate this remarkable milestone with GE’s newest Jenbacher engine customer in Pakistan—Tata Energy. A key goal of GE is to help our customers increase their access to reliable energy and reduce their impact on the environment and their communities. The project to support Tata’s modern spinning mill in Salfi illustrates this point. Tata will benefit from using our Jenbacher engines that are able to generate highly reliable and more efficient electricity in hot climates and harsh operating conditions.”

GE’s Jenbacher gas engines product line team has more than 50 years of experience delivering innovative power solutions to customers around the world, Jenbacher gas engines have set the standard for continuous innovation, high power density as well as low installation costs and emissions. Capable of utilizing a variety of gas types including natural gas, flare gas, biogas, biomass, landfill gas and other gaseous fuel types, Jenbacher engines help industrial companies and municipalities meet their need for reliable on-site power.

During the past several years, distributed power projects, such as the one for Tata Industries, have increased in popularity around the world as companies seek to improve their access to reliable on-site power. With the added benefit of using a variety of different gas types to power the gas engines, industrial and municipal customers can more easily achieve their energy production goals and control their operational costs.

“When we set out to replace our existing gen-sets, we looked for a solution that could solve two main issues—improve our on-site power production efficiency and operate in a small footprint. Our new GE gas engines will help us solve both of these issues and take advantage of all of the benefits related to using natural gas as the primary fuel source,” said Shahid Anwar Tata, director, Tata Energy. “Given the widespread adoption of GE’s Jenbacher gas engines across Pakistan by various industries, we felt confident that GE’s proven Jenbacher engines could deliver on-site power and cooling more reliably than other technologies.”

GE's Jenbacher units are part of GE’s ecomagination portfolio. To qualify for the portfolio, products and services must demonstrate both improved economic value and environmental performance. Ecomagination is GE’s commitment to provide innovative solutions that maximize resources, drive efficiencies and make the world work better.