The international tender for the 1320-MW Rampal Power Plant is expected to be floated in the last week of the current month, reports UNB.
The officials at both Bangladesh-India Friendship Power Company (Pvt) Limited (BIFPCL) and its German-based technical and engineering consultant, Fichtner, are working relentlessly to do the job by January 31.
"Our target is to float the tender before January 31. Preparations are on to meet the target," BIFPCL Chief Technical Officer Anindya Majumder said.
The BIFPCL is a special purpose company formed jointly by Dhaka and New Delhi to implement the Bangladesh-India joint venture power project.
But, environmentalists, left-leaning parties and social organisations are vigorously opposing the project as its site is very close to world heritage Sundarbans mangrove forest.
They fear the project will cast serious impacts on the ecology of the Sundarbans and surrounding areas.
The official sources said Fichtner has prepared a tender document and obtained necessary approval from state-owned Power Development Board (PDB) and Indian National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) to float the tender.
As per the existing plan, the bidder selection process will be closed by June and then contract will be awarded with a target to complete its construction by 2018.
The sources said BIFPCL through the tender will invite the international companies to implement the project on 'bidder's financing' framework.
Under the framework, the selected engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor will arrange the required fund for the project and install the plant on turnkey basis.
In this case, the EPC contractor will have to build a jetty and coal storage along with its equipment supply and engineering works.
However, the BIFPCL will only build some other infrastructures for coal transportation to the project site. The officials said the project will require some 12,236 tonnes to run the 1320-MW power station, having two units of each of the capacity 660 MW.
The officials said the 1320 MW Rampal power plant project will require a total of US$1.82 billion (equivalent to Tk 145.84 billion) fund for implementation. Of this, Dhaka and New Delhi will bear 30 per cent of the project cost as equity on 50:50 basis.
The rest of the fund will come from international financing, which will be arranged by the EPC contractor as a commercial loan. Export credit agency (ECA) loan might be considered as possible financing for the project.
As per the BIFPCL plan, the Rampal plant will be operated through coal imported from Indonesia, Australia or any African country.
The officials said the Rampal power plant is part of the government mega plan to generate 50 per cent power from coal by the year 2030 when the country's total generation will reach 40,000 MW.
The government has taken another 1,200MW capacity coal-fired power generation project at Matarbari in Cox's Bazar with financial support from the Japanese government.
It signed another two deals (MoUs) with two separate Chinese companies to set up two coal-fired power plants in Moheshkhali and Patuakhali, each of 1,320 MW capacity.
