Sep 27, 2016- Twenty-five megawatt of electricity has been added to the national grid from the Upper MarshyangdiA Hydropower Project from Monday, which could bring some respite to power-starved country suffering from 48 hours of weekly outage.
Energy Minister Janardan Sharma announced the commercial operation of the project at a special programme organized in Kathmandu on Monday while lawmaker Bhisma Nath Adhikari inaugurated the project pressing the switch at the plant site in Bhulbule, Lamgunj.
The 50MW project has two turbines—each generating 25MW of electricity. The Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) is yet to construct the transmission line to evacuate the total electricity generated from the project.
Electricity generated from the second unit will be added to the national grid after three months, according to the project, which once in full operation will generate 317 million units of electricity annually.
“Due to some technical reasons, we could not add the total production to the national grid,” said Yan Hung Wale, executive managing director of the project, at Monday’s inauguration programme in Lamgunj.
A joint-venture of China’s SinoHydro and Sagarmatha Power Company, the run-of-the-river project was started in 2012. SinoHydro has 90 percent stake in the project while Sagarmatha Power Company holds the rest of the shares. It is the first hydropower project built with foreign direct investment. According to project officials, the total cost of the project stands at Rs 16 billion. The construction of the project was largely affected by last year’s earthquakes and border blockade.