Weddell Power Station Faces Delay in Commissioning of 43-Megawatt Power Unit After 2012 Fire

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Perth, Australia)--Power and Water Corporation (Darwin, Australia) and United Group Limited (Sydney, Australia) are wrapping up the final work on the 43-megawatt (MW) expansion unit at the existing Weddell Power Station, which is a natural gas power station operating in Darwin, Northern Territory.

Power and Water Corporation built the power station in 2008-2009 with two 43-MW GE LM6000 combustion turbines, which supply 86 MW of electricity to the Darwin-Katherine electricity grid. The addition of the third unit will increase the power station capacity to 129 MW and will add 30% capacity to Darwin's power supply.

In August 2011, Power and Water awarded the engineering, procurement and construction contract to United Group to build the third unit. According to the initial plans, the new unit was projected to kick off by end of 2012; however, there is a significant delay, which was caused by a fire accident at the power plant that destroyed some of the unit's equipment. The UGL team is now finalizing the construction work at the plant and is hoping to air the unit operations by March 2013.

One of the two existing units will undergo a preventive maintenance outage in a week's time, with another minor outage planned on the two units later this year. Power and Water has a long-term service agreement with GE Australia (New South Wales, Australia) to provide operations, engineering and maintenance services for Weddell Power Station.

Power and Water Corporation also operates the Northern Territory's largest 322-MW Channel Island Power Station in Darwin, Australia. The power station is equipped with five GE Frame 6 Gas Turbines, one Mitsubishi Steam Turbine, two Rolls-Royce Trent 60 aero-derivative gas turbines, and one GE Combustion turbine with HRSG, with a combined capacity of 265 MW. Both Weddell and Channel Island are connected to Darwin-Katherine electricity network, which accounts for three-quarters of Northern Territory's electricity generation.

In 2012, Power and Water Corporation proposed a new, 5-MW power plant called as Wadeye Power Plant, which will be fuelled on gas from the Blacktip gas field on the northwest coast of Darwin. The power plant is under construction at the moment, and will be commissioned by the middle of the year.

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