Matarbari Power Plant to Launch Test Run Today

The coal-based Matarbari power plant, which is being constructed near Maheshkhali in Cox's Bazar, is set to begin operation on today.

Abul Kalam Azad, the project director for the power plant, became aware of the problem on Friday night.

He claims that the power plant consists of two separate units, each with a capacity of 600 MW and a combined capacity of 1200 MW. The first unit of the power plant will begin operating in test mode on Saturday. If the first unit's trial operation is successful, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will start up the power producing in December.

He further said the project has made significant progress, with 95 per cent of the infrastructure work already completed, and overall area infrastructure reaching 90% completion.

With finance support from Japan's development agency, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the Matarbari power plant is being built at an estimated cost of Tk 51,800 crore as one of the key projects of the present administration.

Concerned authorities stated that the plant as a whole would need 10,000 tons of coal every day, with each unit requiring 5,000 tons. As of just now, 200,000 tons of coal had been stockpiled, and 65,000 tons would arrive at the manufacturing site on August 7 of the next year.

The project director stated that four tanks with a combined storage capacity of 1.7 million tons have already been constructed alongside two jetties at the project site in order to offload coal directly into the tanks from ships.