Two ships carrying 1,05,627 metric tonnes of coal has arrived at Payra Port 18 days after the Payra thermal power plant halted power generation due to coal shortage.
The MV Athena and the MV-NAVIOS AMBER arrived at the port carrying 41,327 and 64,300 metric tonnes of coal respectively.
Four more coal-laden ships will arrive at Payra in the first week of July, according to plant officials.
Plant Manager Md. Golam Mawla said the Payra thermal power plant is likely to resume power generation after storing about 2 lakh metric tonnes of coal.
However, the official did not rule out the possibility of going into power generation from June 25.
The country's largest thermal power plant, Payra, was completely shut down on June 5 due to fuel shortage.
Due to the failure to pay the outstanding bills of $390 million caused by dollar shortage, production of a unit of the power plant was halted on May 25 as the companies involved stopped supplying coal.
Another unit's production continued until June 5 which was also shut down due to coal shortage. The shutdown of the country’s biggest thermal power plant led to weeks of nationwide load-shedding amid the hottest summer on record.
Shah Abdul Hasib, superintending engineer (operation) of Payra Thermal Power Plant, said the opening of the LC was delayed due to the dollar crisis.
Outstanding bills worth “$100 million have already been cleared through the World Bank,” he said.
The Panama flag-carrying MV-NAVIOS AMBER’ ship arrived at Matarbari deep sea artificial jetty Friday noon, said Alfaz Ahmed, security officer at Matarbari Coal Power Project.
Later, the ship was taken to the coal power plant jetty from the outer anchorage of the port with the help of four tugs, including strong tugs Kandari 2 and 4 of Chittagong port.
The Security Officer said that the 12.5 meter draft ship carrying coal from Tarahan port in Indonesia has arrived in Bangladesh.
This is the fifth ship to bring coal to this power plant. With this, more than 3 lakh mts of coal have arrived in the last two months.
He said that experimental power generation activities with coal are going on. Power from Matarbari coal-fired power plant will be added to the national grid soon, he hoped.
