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Johannesburg - General Electric Co (GE) has installed a new 280 megawatt power plant at Sasol's Secunda coal-to-fuels facility in South Africa, which could help ease the country's energy crisis, it said on Wednesday.
The plant is the first such installation in South Africa of GE Energy's gas turbines, and will provide power for the production of Sasol's synthetic fuels, with excess electricity sold to Eskom, the state-owned power utility.
"The new Secunda plant will enable Sasol to increase its on-site power generation capacity while also reducing electricity demand on Eskom," said Mark Digby, GE Energy Africa Region Executive in a statement.
The state-owned utility Eskom, which provides 95% of the country's power, has been rationing electricity since January, when the national grid nearly collapsed.
The crisis has marred South Africa's investor-friendly image and dented economic growth in Africa's biggest economy by cutting gold and platinum output, and slowed big manufacturers.
GE also signed a multi-million dollar service deal with Sasol to cover maintenance for the two GE Frame 9E gas turbines installed at Secunda over the 15-year period. The agreement with Sasol also includes 24-hour-a-day monitoring service, GE said.
Initially, natural gas will be the fuel for the gas turbines, but low-BTU (BTU is a unit of energy used in the power industry) gas/flare gas would be used in the future, for a further reduction in emissions, GE said.
GE already has some 22 steam turbines at Secunda.
- Reuters