Maiden wind power project in private sector

The government yesterday approved a proposal to set up a 55-megawatt wind power plant in Bagerhat, a move that may give a much-needed fillip to its efforts to tap the country's unrealised renewable energy potential.

The cabinet committee on purchase gave its consent to the proposal from a Chinese-Bangladeshi consortium to set up the plant on a build-own-operate basis under a contract with the Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB).

Law Minister Anisul Haq chaired the meeting.

The consortium of Envision Energy (Jiangsu) of China, SQ Trading and Engineering of Bangladesh, and Envision Renewable Energy of Hong Kong will establish the plant.

The BPDB will buy electricity from the plant at a tariff of $13.20 cents, or Tk 10.56 per kilowatt-hour unit for 20 years, Abu Saleh Mostafa Kamal, additional secretary of the cabinet division, told reporters after the cabinet meeting.  The consortium was the lone bidder for the project, said a BPDB official, news agency UNB reported.  

Bangladesh is yet to significantly exploit its potential in wind power even though studies have found that the country could generate a handsome amount of electricity from the clean source of energy.

Three wind turbines with a combined capacity of 3MW have been in operation for the last few years in Feni and the coastal Kutubdia, according to the Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority (Sreda).

The Installed capacity for renewable energy stands at 650.53 MW with solar energy accounting for 416MW and hydropower 230MW.

Bangladesh's southern coastal belt offers potential for generating power through wind, according to a study by the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

The study, carried out on behalf of the power division, found that coastal areas of Khulna, Barishal and Chattogram divisions have more than 6 metres per second (m/s) wind speed at 120-metre height, which is sufficient for generating electricity.

For wind speeds of 5.75-7.75 m/s, there are more than 20,000 square kilometres of land with a gross wind potential of more than 30,000MW, the study said.

The BPDB signed a contract in March 2015 to award a 60MW wind power project to US-DK Green Energy (BD), a joint venture of Taylor Engineering Group of the US, PH Consulting Group of Denmark and Multiplex Green Energy of Bangladesh, to set up the plant at Kurushkul in Cox's Bazar.

But the sponsor failed to implement the project in the last five years, according to UNB.

The state-run Rural Power Company is working to set up a 10MW plant in Kalapara of Patuakhali. The plant is scheduled to begin electricity generation on December 31, 2022, according to the Sreda website.