Singapore's Sembcorp to build 400MW power plant
Singapore's Sembcorp Utilities will set up a 400MW dual-fuel power plant in Sirajganj as the cabinet committee on purchase yesterday approved the power division's proposal.
The government will purchase electricity from the plant for Tk 3.19 a unit if it is gas-fired and Tk 13.57 if it runs on diesel.
The power plant will be operated for 22 years by North-West Power Generation Company as a joint venture with Sembcorp.
In 22 years, the government will have to pay Tk 21,507 crore if it is gas-based and Tk 34,835 crore if it is diesel-run.
Also at yesterday's meeting, which was chaired by Finance Minister AMA Muhith, the approval was given to a proposal to import 30 to 50 megawatts of electricity from India.
As per the bilateral agreement, Bangladesh can import 500 MW of power from India every day, but due to transmission system loss the country gets 30 to 50 MW less electricity.
So, the power division has now sought to separately import the 30 to 50 MW electricity lost for Tk 57 crore to Tk 231 crore. Besides, the purchase committee gave approval to three packages of around Tk 2,050 crore for elevation of the Joydevpur-Chandra-Tangail-Elenga highway to four lanes.
Kyeryong-Spectra Joint Venture, AML-HCM JV and Samwhan-Mir Akhter Joint Venture won the bids for work of the three packages.
Another tender is pending for the project, the total cost of which has been fixed at Tk 3,066.80 crore.
The highways division in its proposal said the project is part of the South Asia Sub-regional Economic Cooperation Link Road that is mostly being financed by the Asian Development Bank, Abu Dhabi Fund for Development and Opec Fund for International Development.
Once the project is completed, road communication between the northern part of the country and Dhaka will be safer and smooth, according to the proposal.
Besides the meeting of the cabinet committee on purchase, another meeting of the cabinet committee on economic affairs was held yesterday at the same venue with the finance minister in chair.
A proposal for purchase of modern equipment worth more than Tk 200 crore to step up mobile phone, email and social network surveillance for the National Telecommunication Monitoring Centre (NTMC) was placed by the home ministry at the meeting.
After the two meetings, Additional Secretary Mustafizur Rahman briefed reporters about the purchase committee proposals but refused to disclose anything about the home ministry's proposal.
The home ministry has sought relaxation of the Public Procurement Regulations for direct purchase of the equipment, ministry officials said.
Modern equipment is required to assume more control over obstructing or recording users' telephonic or online communications such that intelligence activities could be conducted more smoothly, according to the proposal.
The NTMC, which has been working under the home ministry since February 2014, conducts lawful interception to help intelligence and law enforcement agencies ensure state security.