BISHKEK (TCA) — The government of Kyrgyzstan on March 1 announced a tender for the use and development of brown-coal deposits Kara-Keche and Min-Kush (Ak-Ulak area), the Kyrgyz Economy Ministry said.
Payment for participation in the tender has been fixed at 15 million Kyrgyz soms (around US $205 thousand).
Applicants should also pay 2.3 million soms for geological data on the deposits and provide a guarantee fee in the amount of 76 million soms.
The tender commission will receive applications until 15 April 2016.
The Kyrgyz government earlier announced plans to build a coal-fired electric power plant at the Kara-Keche coal deposit in the Naryn province.
If the Kara-Keche power plant is built, as stipulated by the National Energy Program until 2025, coal extraction will increase to three million tons per year by 2025. The Kara-Keche power plant would enable supply of electricity to the north of Kyrgyzstan, remove part of the workload from the Bishkek thermal electric power plant, and reduce imports of expensive natural gas and coal.
Kyrgyzstan’s coal reserves are estimated at 2.2 billion tons.
Today more than half of the coal mined in Kyrgyzstan is produced by the open-cut method. As to the quality of local coal, its ash content is quite high — 35%-45%.
In the peak production year of 1979, 4.5 million tons of coal was mined in Kyrgyzstan. Since then coal mining in the country has dropped dramatically due to high transportation costs and the use of outdated mining technologies.
