ADB gives $205m to help improve power supply
The Asian Development Bank is going to provide Bangladesh with $205 million in finances to help increase access to reliable supply of electricity and improve efficiency and capacity of power systems.
Under the loan scheme, the existing analogue billing meters will be replaced by seven lakh pre-payment meters in Dhaka division. The loan will also help replace the aging steam and gas turbine power plants with a more efficient 400-megawatt gas-fired combined cycle power plant at the Ashuganj Power Station complex.
Bangladesh will also upgrade and construct 72 kilometres of transmission lines and four substations, according to a statement.
Mohammad Mejbahuddin, senior secretary of the Economic Relations Division, and Kazuhiko Higuchi, country director of the Bangladesh resident mission of the ADB, signed the loan agreements at the ERD office in Dhaka yesterday.
The assistance is the third tranche of the $700 million “power system expansion and efficiency improvement investment programme” approved by the ADB in 2012.
The Islamic Development Bank is co-financing the third tranche of the overall programme, the ADB said.
“The project will generate 400MW of electricity, using the same amount of energy that previously produced 220MW, achieving more than an 80 percent efficiency increase in energy use,” Higuchi said.
“In addition to bringing more stable and reliable electricity supply to users, the project also aims for higher operational and financial efficiency in the distribution utilities by bringing in prepaid meters in an operational scale.”
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