July Kick-Off for $750 Million New Brunswick Power Plant Refurbishment Project

---

Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources Incorporated; Houston, Texas). New Brunswick Power Corporation (NB) is preparing to begin a 14-week shutdown, refurbishment and fuel conversion on the first of three units, this July, at its largest power plant, the Coleson Cove Power Station. Construction, in preparation for the shutdown, began in December of 2002.

Constructed in 1976, the Coleson Cove Power Station is located on Canada's east coast, in Saint John, New Brunswick. With total capacity of 1,050-megawatt (MW), the facility consists of three 350MW Hitachi steam turbine generator sets, powered by three Babcock & Wilcox opposed-fired boilers. The second unit is scheduled to start in April 2004, and the third in July 2004. The $450 million project completion is planned for November 2004.

Part of the refurbishment project is to convert the plant's fuel supply from oil/coal-fired to Orimulsion. Orimulsion is a mixture of 30% water and 70% bitumen, a tar-like heavy hydrocarbon from the Orinoco Belt of eastern Venezuela. The name Orimulsion comes from "Orinoco Emulsion". It can be used in place of oil, natural gas or coal. Orimulsion, "the fourth fossil fuel", has been in commercial use by Italy, Canada, Denmark, and Japan since 1991. It has similar physical and chemical properties to fuel oil, and emissions of pollutants aren't that different in character from fossil fuels. When spilled into the water, Orimulsion doesn't float but sinks into the water column. Orimulsion isn't being used as a fuel anywhere in the U.S or Canada except by NB Power at their 315-megawatt Dalhousie power station.

Orimulsion will be supplied to the Coleson Cove Power Station from BITOR under a 20-year agreement signed in July 2001. Under the contract, BITOR will transport a minimum of 1.6 million metric tons of Orimulsion annually. It will be delivered to Saint John by large tankers and then pipelined to the plant. The first shipment is scheduled to arrive late fall 2004. BITOR (Bitumenes Orinoco, S.A) (Caracas, Venezuela) is a subsidiary of Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A (PDVSA), the Venezuelan national energy corporation. BITOR is responsible for the development and production of bitumen resources, as well as the processing and marketing of Orimulsion, it's trademark product. BITOR's American subsidiary is BITOR American Corporation (Boca Raton, Florida).

A major part of the refurbishment project involves the installment of two scrubber towers, a limestone building (the scrubber requires 200,000 tons a year), a wet electrostatic precipitator (ESP), fuel handling and combustion equipment for the fuel switching, install new burners, with modifications to boiler components.

A $280-million contract was awarded to Babcock & Wilcox Canada Limited (Cambridge, Ontario) that involves engineering, supplying, boiler modifications, commissioning of the flue gas desulfurization (FGD) equipment and wet ESP. Babcock & Wilcox Canada provides service to the North American electric utility and nuclear market. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Babcock & Wilcox Company (Barberton, Ohio), which is an operating unit of McDermott International Incorporated (NYSE: MDR) (New Orleans, Louisiana).

Hitachi Limited (NYSE: HIT) (Tokyo, Japan) got the contract for the turbine overhaul. The company markets and manufactures a broad range of electronics, semiconductors and industrial equipment and services throughout North America.

New Brunswick Power Corporation (Fredericton, New Brunswick) is the largest electric utility in Atlantic Canada, and one of North America's most diverse generating transmission systems.