Chinese Modernizing Two Power Units at Bishkek Heating Plant

Since July, some 350 specialists from China’s Tebian Electric Apparatus Stock Co. Ltd. (TBEA) have been carrying out a full overhaul of two power generating units at the Bishkek Thermal Power Plant (TPP), Taalaibek Baigaziyev, Deputy Mayor of Bishkek for Energy Issues, told Birinchi Radio. The Bishkek TPP generates 13% of all electricity produced in Kyrgyzstan (with the rest generated by hydropower plants) and provides heat and hot water to almost two-thirds of the capital. TBEA built the two power units that are currently under repair as part of the Bishkek TPP modernization that commenced in 2014. Following a loan agreement between China’s Export-Import Bank and the Kyrgyz government in 2013, TBEA was granted the contract and modernized the plant for $386 million. According to Baigaziyev, these two Chinese power units were commissioned in 2017 and were not repaired until this July. In past winters, they worked with a maximum load of 210 megawatts. This winter, their capacity is planned to increase to 300 megawatts. The Bishkek TPP has seen two significant accidents in recent years. One accident occurred in January 2018, when the plant’s breakdown left the city without heating for three days amid freezing air temperatures. The most recent accident happened on February 2 of this year, in the old part of the power plant that the Chinese did not modernize. An explosion at the plant seriously injured three people. It caused the plant’s breakdown, forcing authorities to declare hot water and heating restrictions in some parts of the city as the plant’s staff worked to repair the damage. Following the accident, Kyrgyzstan’s president Sadyr Japarov ordered the complete modernization of the aging thermal power plant.