Mak-Ban rehab starts next year

The National Power Corp. (Napocor) expects the rehabilitation of the 425 MW Mak-Ban geothermal power plant to start early next year.

Mak-Ban plant maintenance manager Efren San Sebastian said over the weekend that based on the plan approved by the Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (now Japan Bank for International Cooperation or JBIC), actual rehabilitation will start on February 2003.

San Sebastian said if the rehabilitation will commence on schedule, the rehab program will be completed by January 2004.

The rehab program will include the repair and/or replacement of various equipment and materials such as steam supply, steam turbine and auxiliaries, cooling water system cooling tower, generator and excitation system, transformer, uninterruptible power supply system, instrument and control system and utility and instrument air system.

According to San Sebastian, the loan, amounting to ¥3.03 billion and $7.73 million, provides for only a partial rehabilitation of the Mak-Ban power plant or covers Units one to four of the six units of the power facility.

The Napocor official said they are looking at the possibility of asking for additional fund from JBIC to make a full rehabilitation of the Mak-Ban, one of the oldest power plants in the country.

The rehabilitation of Mak-Ban geothermal power plant is aimed at improving its efficiency, availability and capability.

After the rehabilitation, the capacity of the power facility’s units will be increased from 55,000 kilowatt (kw) to 63,000 kw with improved steam rate of 7.139 kilogram per kw-hour from eight kg/kw-hr.

This rehabilitation program will also allow the plant to operate at 90 percent capacity and its availability rate to also increase to 90 percent. At present, the capacity and availability factors of Mak-ban power plant stood 73 percent and 82 percent.