PKN ORLEN Fires Up Poland's First CCGT Power Plant

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--A 463-megawatt (MW), combined-cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power plant in Poland has been fired successfully for the first time.

First fire was achieved at the Wloclawek plant, with the gas turbine reaching its target of 3,000 revolutions per minutes (rpm). Owner PKN ORLEN (WSE:PKN) (Plock, Poland) said Wloclawek is the country's first high-capacity CCGT plant. It is being constructed by a consortium including General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) (Fairfield, Connecticut) and engineering and construction firm SNC-Lavalin Polska, part of SNC-Lavalin (TSX:SNC) (Montreal, Quebec). PKN ORLEN is a major Polish oil refiner and owner of the largest network of service stations in the country.

The plant project, with a total investment value of $362 million, is based around a single-shaft unit consisting of a GE Energy Frame 9FB Combustion Turbine with a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG), weighing 330 tonnes. GE has been contracted to provides services and maintenance for 12 years.

"It is a historic moment for PKN ORLEN and for Poland's power industry as a whole," said Piotr Chełmiński, a member of the PKN ORLEN management board, Development and Power Generation. "We have started up our flagship project, and the country's first high-capacity CCGT unit with vast potential for strengthening ORLEN Group's operational excellence and improving the security of the National Power System."

The next stages of the start-up process will focus on preparing the plant for its first synchronisation with the national grid, which is scheduled for later this month.

PKN ORLEN is constructing another CCGT plant at its Plock Refinery. The planned project is larger, at 596 MW, and will be constructed with German engineering firm Siemens AG (FWB:SI) (Munich, Germany). With an estimated value of $400.6 million, the project is expected to be completed by the end of 2017.

Poland relies on coal for about 85% of its electricity, but most of the plants are old and inefficient, while the government is under pressure from the European Union (EU) to lower its emissions and clean up its energy mix. Last May, the government pledged not build any more coal-fired power plants, while committing to investing in making existing plants more efficient. For additional information, see May 20, 2015, article - Poland: No New Coal-Fired Power Plants.

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