Power generation at Barapukuria halted, no signs of restarting soon

Equipment necessary for the plant’s operations is unavailable and there is no indication of when it can be procured, the chief engineer says

The only active unit of the Barapukuria Thermal Power Plant in Dinajpur has halted operations due to a technical issue.

The power plant’s Chief Engineer Abu Bakr Siddique says he is unsure when the issue will be fixed, but suggests it may not be any time soon.

“We need two electro-hydraulic oil pumps to run our turbines,” he said. “In 2022, one of our electro-hydraulic oil pumps broke.”

“We sent a letter to the contractor, but they haven’t been able to supply the equipment. As a result, our unit has been running with a single pump all this time. That pump broke on Monday and now the whole plant is closed.”

The production capacity of the coal-based power plant’s two units is 125 MW. The second unit has been closed since the end of 2020. Repair work is ongoing on the first unit.

The third unit, which shut down on Monday, has a production capacity of 274 MW but was supplying between 190-210 MW of power to the national grid.

Harbin Electric International, the contracted Chinese supplier, has been contacted over the issue. It may take at least two weeks to procure the necessary equipment.

Asked about the situation, Abu Bakr said: “The company has a five-year contract from February 2020 to February 2025 for supplying spare parts.

In response to a question on when the power plant could resume operations, he said:

“We spoke to the contractor on Monday. They said it will take at least two weeks.”

“These parts are not available in Bangladesh, so they can’t be bought. We can’t say at the moment when we will be able to resume power generation.”