REL, NTPC join hands

It's the coming together of the country8217;s largest public and private sector power firms. The Anil Dhirubhai Ambani-controlled Reliance ...

It8217;s the coming together of the country8217;s largest public and private sector power firms. The Anil Dhirubhai Ambani-controlled Reliance Energy Ltd REL and the public sector power major, National Thermal Power Corporation NTPC have decided to join hands to develop international power projects.

To begin with, the two companies have submitted a joint expression of interest EoI for developing projects in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The projects in question are the 850 mw Shuquiq Power Project in Saudi Arabia and 500 mw brown field Fujairah Power Project in UAE.

For these projects, EoIs have been submitted with REL as the lead developer-cum-engineering procurement and construction EPC contractor while NTPC8217;s role would be that of the operation and maintenance O038;M contractor. However, if selected, both will pick up equity in these projects, sources said.

Asked to comment, a senior NTPC official said, 8220;Presently these projects are being taken jointly on a case-to-case basis. REL and NTPC do not have any formal agreement on developing global projects as such. NTPC is pursuing other international power projects on its own and so is REL.8221; However, REL officials refused to divulge details.

For the 500 mw Fujairah project, REL has already been pre-qualified for participation in the tender. The 800 mw Shuquiq project is a power-cum-water desalination project. In order to pre-qualify the parties, REL and NTPC have now been asked to submit the statement of qualification SOQ by September 17.

8220;Another tender is expected shortly for providing energy audit consultancy services to M/s Saudi Electricity Company. NTPC was pre-qualified to participate in the tender in January this year and we are shortly expecting the tender document now,8221; a senior official said.

REL8217;s growing expertise in the EPC sector can be gauged from the fact that its EPC and Contracts Division recorded a turnover of Rs 1,244 crore 284 million last fiscal, compared to Rs 586 crore in the previous year, an increase of 112 per cent. The division had about Rs 3,500 crore 800 million worth of orders on hand as on March 31, 2005, an increase of 300 per cent over the last year.

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On its own, NTPC is already submitted a draft technical proposal to the Sri Lankan government for setting up a 900 mw coal/LNG power project. A detailed proposal for this project will now be submitted shortly. BHEL is likely to join NTPC for this project.