Five bidders have submitted their request for proposals (RFP) with Power Development Board (PDB) for two power projects that will generate a total of 675 megawatts.
The two gas-fired power plants to be built under the private sector are Bibiyana phase-2 450 MW and Bhola 225 MW combined cycle power projects.
These tenders drew around two dozen of offers when PDB sought pre-qualification documents in May.
Besides the five bidders’ move on Thursday, two bidders submitted their RFP for the Meghnaghat phase-2 dual-fuel combined cycle 450 MW private power project in the last week.
The combined cycle plants use the heat generated by simple cycle gas or the oil generator unit to produce extra power and thus, ensure less fuel consumption and a lower cost of power generation.
Officials said these bids would have drawn in more competition if PDB was not so inflexible on the project implementation period. PDB wants that the simple cycle part of these projects be implemented within 24 months of contract and the combined cycle within 36 months.
“Many bidders want more time,” said a PDB official, adding that a Malaysian company, YTL Corporation, had quitted from the Bibiyana phase-1 power tender at the last moment because the tendering authority did not want to relax the project implementation period.
The bidders who filed their RFP documents in the Bibiyana-2 project on Thursday are: YTL Corporation, Summit Industrial and Mercantile Corporation along with US General Electric (GE) and Indian GMR.
The Bhola bidders are — Summit-GE and Malaysian-Bangladeshi joint venture Ranhill-STS.
The Meghnaghat bid drew offers from Malaysian Powertek and Summit-GE.
PDB wants to complete the bidding process within December, so that these plants can launch operations by 2013.
The Bibiyana 2 would use gas from the Bibiyana gas field, while the Bhola power projects from the Shahbazpur gas field.
The Bibiyana field that produces around 700 million cubic feet of gas a day (mcfd) is now expected to produce 1,000 mcfd by 2013.
Meanwhile, the Power Cell has pre-qualified seven bidders in the second re-tendering of the 450 MW Sirajganj Power project.
These companies are — GDF Suez Energy of Thailand, local consortium of ERM-Shasha Denim, GMR of India, YTL Corporation of Malaysia, Essar Power of India, Beijing Jingneng Corp of China and Summit. It disqualified one local company — Rupayan Power.
