Napocor awards P2-B contract to Sumitomo

The National Power Corp. (Napocor) has awarded the transmission line project for the Iligan power plant to Sumitomo Electric Industries Inc. The project is worth approximately P2 billion.

Involved is a 500-kilovolt (kV) transmission line connecting the 1,200-megawatt (MW) Ilijan gas-fired power plant in Batangas to the different industrial and residential end-users through the Luzon Grid.

Sumitomo won over seven other bidders. The next critical phase is awarding the contract for the substation.

"We are still evaluating the pre-qualification bids for the substation project," Napocor president Federico Puno said.

The substation will be for the furnishing, delivery, installation and commissioning on a turn key basis for the 230 kV and 500 kV substation equipment including line protection and communication system for the substations in Dasmariñas, Tayabas, San Jose and Ilijan plant.

The groups which submitted bids for the substation equipment were: ABBA Network Partner; a consortium composed of Alstom T&D Systems Ltd., Cogelex Alsthom and ABB Calor Emag Schaltanlagen AG; First Philippine Holdings Corp., and Balfour Beatty Ltd.; Hitachi Asia Ltd.; a consortium composed of Harbin Power Engineering Co. Ltd. (HPE), Heilongjang Power Transmission & Transformer Construction Corp. (HPTC);

Northeast Electric Power Design Institute of National Electricity Co. (NEPDI); a consortium of Pacific Power (International) Pty. Ltd., Electricity Transmission Authority of New South Wales (Transgird), Hyundai Engineering Co. Ltd. (Hyundai), Kanematsu Corp. (KG);

Northeast China Electric Power Import and Export Corp., Vatech Reyrolle Projects Ltd., Siemens AG, Toshiba Corp., Schneider Electric-France, and Mitsui & Co.

The 1,200-megawatt gas-fired combined cycle power generation facility will be operated by Kepco-Ilijan Corp. (Keilco), the local subsidiary of the Korean Power Co. (Kepco) of South Korea. Kepco is reportedly in the middle of talks with Napocor, Mitsubishi Corp. and Southern Energy Power Corp. to finalize the equity-sharing scheme.

The $710-million Iligan plant is the biggest gas-fired project in the country. It is owned by the Philippine government through Napocor. Keilco has been tapped to construct and operate the plant under a 20-year build-operate-transfer (BOT) arrangement.

The plant's energy source will come from the natural gas reserves of the Camago-Malampaya wells off the shores of Palawan and Batangas, and it is operated by the Shell Philippines Exploration BV (Spex), Texaco of the US, and the Philippine National Oil Corp. (PNOC).