**136MW power project to be inaugurated on Monday **
*Saturday, December 08, 2007
By our correspondent*
KARACHI: **Pakistan Power Resources’ (PPR) 136MW power plant at Bhikhi, Sheikhupura, Punjab, is being inaugurated on Monday.
The $80 million project took about six months to be completed and is currently producing up to 80MW of electricity.** The principal sponsor of the project is Lahore-based Associated Group (AG), also Pakistan’s largest LPG producer.
“The power plant symbolises enduring and abiding investor confidence in Pakistan and its economy,” said AG spokesman Fasih Ahmed in a statement issued here. He said the project company, PPR, is based in Oklahoma and is co-sponsored by the US state’s former governor.
PPR power plant is the second of the two fast-track rental power plants that were awarded by the government through a competitive bidding process and which have been set up in the current calendar year.
AG is also going to be taking charge of the 3x50MW Lakhra power plant for a 20-year period. The rehabilitation of the Lakhra project, Pakistan’s only coal-fired power plant, should encourage investors to tap indigenous coal for power generation, said Ahmed. US-based Wood Group is the O and M operator of the Bhikhi Plant and has hired and trained Pakistanis who will run the plant at all times.