BELCO power plant to break ground in the new year

WEDNESDAY, JULY 13: The $130 million redevelopment of the BELCO power plant is expected to break ground early next year.

The company is pushing ahead with plans to install four to six hi-tech new diesel generators and to decommission its original power plant.

Andrew Parsons, BELCO president, said: “We’re pulling together the formal request for proposals and that will be issued within the next few days.

“We expect then to formally agree to that in November and our plans are to break ground early in 2012, with a planned completion date of 2013.”

Roger Todd, BELCO assistant vice-president for engineering, added advances in technology meant the new generators would produce less vibration and would ultimately be quieter.

Demand

The new generators will also have a single high stack, rather than the individual, shorter stacks of the older engines.

This makes them ‘greener’ due to a greater dispersal of pollutants.

Mr Parsons said: “The individual stacks on each of the older generators cause us most issues with regard to our neighbours.

“With our new plant, we will meet and exceed all the clean air standards and requirements the Government has in place.”

He added the older power station may be levelled, but if alternative means of energy emerge, it could be kept for battery storage.

Mr Todd said the planning application for the generators was submitted at the end of last year and approved on May 26.

“Approval for the new plant — which will be to the east side of the existing BELCO complex, where the transport area is at present — took around 50 meetings with Government officials,” he said.

“The environmental impact is a positive story — when the old power station was built, there wasn’t the technology available for sound reduction, emissions and vibration that there is today.” Two of the newer generators at the power station in Serpentine Road will be kept as a back-up.

Mr Todd said the newer generators used diesel technology similar to that used by large ocean-going vessels such as cruise liners and cargo ships.

The growth in demand for electricity has averaged 1.5 per cent a year in the last few years, and the generators are capable of meeting similar rises in demand.

“Based on our predictions, by 2017, if no replacements are made, we wouldn’t be able to service demand,” said Mr Todd.

He reiterated BELCO was still committed to producing 20 per cent of its power from renewable sources within the decade.

The company is examining alternative sources such as wind, wave, solar and burning waste to create greener energy.

Mr Todd said: “We have to make sure that the lights don’t go out in the meantime.”