Ready to set sail:The barge-mounted power plant on the Kakinada coast in East Godavari district.T. APPALA NAIDU  

The exercise of shifting India’s only 220 MW barge-mounted power plant located on the Kakinada coast has commenced. It will be shipped to Turkey through the Kakinada deep-sea port.

The power plant was brought to the Kakinada coast in April 2010 from the Mangalore coast, where it was first commissioned in November 2001.

Owned by GMR Energy Limited, the plant, developed by the U.S.-based GE Technology, was shut down in 2013 citing lack of availability of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) that was supposedly procured from the D-6 block in the Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin.

“We have already begun the exercise of shifting the country’s only barge-mounted power plant out of the Kakinada coast. The plant will be shipped to Turkey via the Kakinada deep sea port, from where the receiver will plan the transportation until it reaches the destination,” GMR group’s communication officer M. Srimanth Reddy told The Hindu .

‘Clearances obtained’

The details of the buyer who will commission the Rs. .600 crore power plant in Turkey have not been shared by the GMR group.

“We have obtained all the clearances, including the ‘yard dismantling’ clearance. The power distribution company authorities have also given the nod for shifting the plant to the port by a towing vessel,” Mr. Srimanth Reddy said. By April-end, the power plant will be leaving the coast. On Saturday, loading of the power plant machinery on the barge, VAMSEE 5 - KAKINADA, was under way at the plant site near Kumbhabhishekam point on the Kakinada coast.

‘Huge losses’

The GMR group has reportedly witnessed huge losses on the power plant during the three years of its operation.