Indorama power plant output rises by 10MW after GE upgrade

Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals is leveraging General Electric’s technology to upgrade its gas turbines helping to increase overall plant output by over 10 Megawatts (MW) while boosting the power plant’s output and availability.

Upgrading ageing turbines and replacing worn parts as well as regular maintenance can help industries, even power companies improve the performance of ageing assets and raise capacity.

This appears to be one of the key priorities of GE Gas & Power as cash-strapped companies and governments struggle with raising money to build new plants in a depressed economy.

“More efficient power plants mean more power output available for power plant operators to respond to the growing energy needs of their end-users. With our customized and innovative solutions, we are laser focused on helping our customers increase operational performance, output, and profitability”, said Kenneth Oyakhire, Services Executive of GE’s Gas Power business, Sub-Saharan Africa.

GE delivers across the entire energy ecosystem from generation to transmission and distribution and throughout the region. Its built technologies are supported by local service and maintenance teams to help ensure access to reliable and sustainable energy.

Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals Limited (IEPL) operates state of the art Petrochemicals & Fertilizer plants, which produces a range of Polyethylene (PE) & Polypropylene (PP) products as well as Ammonia & Urea Fertilizers.

Read also: Seplat grows after-tax profit by 144% to N34bn

This modernisation at Eleme, the company said, increased the turbine’s output by 5.1 Megawatts (MW), more than doubling the previously expected power output increase of 2.5 MW – and effectively bringing the cumulative power increase on all three turbines to over 10 MW.

“We are delighted by GE’s performance improvement package on our 6B turbine. It was executed on time to the highest standard of safety and quality. By increasing the availability and overall reliability of our power plant, we improved the performance of our operations, and we will be able to contribute to the nation’s economic growth,” the company said in a release.

The upgrade will help extend the hot gas path component life of the unit, increase availability and lower maintenance costs by eliminating a combustion inspection and extending maintenance intervals between hot gas path inspections to as much as 32,000 hours.

In addition, the upgrade is expected to increase output and enhance heat rate through improved materials and airflows, increase parts life up to 96,000 hours, reduce clearances and leakages, and enable firing temperature increases.

GE says its power plants deliver flexible, efficient and reliable power to millions of people around the world. With almost 70 years of presence in Sub-Saharan Africa, GE has been collaborating with energy stakeholders to deploy innovative technologies tailored to respond to the needs of the Sub-Saharan Africa region with reliable baseload and flexible power.