Iran to Improve Power Plant Efficiency

Iran has decided to phase out inefficient power plants, improve the aging electricity infrastructure and move toward modern power production technology, head of Iran's Thermal Power Plants Holding Company said.

"Under the new regulations set by the Energy Ministry, all new power plant units must have efficiency of 58% and above," Mohsen Tarztalab was quoted as saying by Mehr News Agency on Friday.

"The ministry will not approve construction of power plants with low efficiency and plans are  in place to improve the efficiency of existing power plants by converting them into combined-cycle units," he noted.

With an installed power production capacity of around 75,000 megawatts, Iran meets almost 80% of its electricity demand from aging thermal plants operating for decades.

It is reported that steps have been taken to convert the conventional plants into efficient combined-cycle units.

Close to 12,000 MW is produced from hydroelectric plants and 1,000 MW from the sole nuclear power plant in Bushehr, south Iran.

A combined-cycle power plant, or CCPP, uses both gas and steam turbines to produce up to 50% more electricity from the same fuel than a traditional simple-cycle plant. The waste heat from the gas turbine is routed to the nearby steam turbine, which generates extra power.

As part of the drive to help reduce the energy sector's role in air pollution, several gas-fired power plants are being replaced with combined-cycle plants.

According to Tarztalab, the government has approved plans to bankroll several combined-cycle power projects worth over $2.7 billion through foreign funding.

"The new CCPP units would have a total output capacity of more than 5,000 MW and are set to be built in Bandar Abbas, Andimeshk, Omidiyeh, Hamedan, Buin Zahra, Salafchegan and Khorramabad," he noted.

According to published reports, German engineering company Siemens is to supply Bandar Abbas Thermal Power Plant in south Iran with several F-class turbines that would lift its production efficiency from 30% to 58%.

A new CCPP unit with an output capacity of 484 MW was also launched this month in Kerman Province. The unit, known as Kahnuj Shoubad Power Plant, cost $350 million.