OREANDA-NEWS. GE , in a consortium with China National Machinery and Equipment Import and Export Corporation, has been awarded a US$117 million order from Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) for repowering Unit 3 of the Ghorashal Power Plant, the largest power station in Bangladesh, located in the Narsingdi district. This will be the first repowering project for the country and will provide a much-needed increase in power generation capacity for Bangladesh by adding more than 200 megawatts (MW) of cleaner power to the national grid.

The project calls for repowering the existing 210 MW Power Machines (LMZ 200) steam turbine —which is run by a gas-fired boiler—by transforming it into a combined cycle power plant. The repowering will be achieved by installing a gas turbine and a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) to generate an efficient 416.3 MW in combined cycle mode.

 “GE is proud to be a partner in building and expanding the power generation infrastructure of Bangladesh and is committed to help the country achieve its energy goals of providing electricity to all by 2021,” said Deepesh Nanda, CEO for GE’s Gas Power Systems business—GE South Asia. “With this project, GE’s suite of combined cycle power plant solutions will breathe new life into the plant while helping to lower its carbon footprint substantially.”

As part of the overall repowering scope, the station’s existing steam turbine will be retrofitted with GE’s advanced reaction design steam turbine high pressure (HP) module, intermediate pressure (IP) module and lower pressure (LP) inner module to suit the new steam parameters. GE’s innovative solutions will help to substantially reduction carbon emissions from the power plant by enhancing the station’s overall efficiency of the plant to 54 percent.

GE gained global capabilities to service non-GE supplied equipment through its acquisition of Alstom Power’s thermal services business in November 2015. The company has installed more than 6 gigawatts (GW) of repowering projects worldwide. Currently, about 1.9 GW of Bangladesh’s installed power base is from GE, representing more than 30 gas turbines.

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