Xayaburi dam power now feeding EGAT in Loei
CK Power Plc has succeeded in distributing electricity from the first generator unit of the Xayaburi Hydroelectric Power Project to the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand or EGAT, the company’s managing director, Thanawat Trivisvavet, said through a press release on Monday.
Thanawat added that Xayaburi HPP began selling electricity to EGAT from its first generator unit during the “unit operation period” (UOP) after the authority first gave its approval that the unit was ready to begin operation.
The electricity from the first unit, the first of seven electricity generators, is now official being sold to EGAT via the 500 kV transmission line between the power plant located in Xayaburi province in Laos and Tha Li in Loei province, Thailand.
The achievement of this crucial milestone marks the first official sale of electricity from the 1,285MW Xayaburi Hydroelectric Power Project since its construction began in 2012.
The Xayaburi HPP is the first mega run-of-river power plant on the lower Mekong River to have made substantial investments aimed at mitigating environmental and social impacts through state-of-the-art facilities to flush sediments and to allow passage of migrating fish.
The project is now more than 98-per-cent completed, he said.
The first generator has been running smoothly and continuously without any concerns or problems, which demonstrates that the Xayaburi HPP has been designed and built with the best international engineering standards, he claimed.
The Xayaburi HPP is expected to be a key contributor to CK Power's operating performance when it achieves its COD later this year, said Thanawat.