Bangladesh muses about use of wind power potential

Bangladesh has now moved to utilise wind-power potential with an eye to reducing its reliance on imported fuels to meet the mounting energy demand.

The country's largest wind-powered Cox's Bazar 60-megawatt plant is all set to start commercial operation in October amid struggles to source fossil fuels.

Eighty-per cent of work on the facility, owned by US-DK Green Energy (BD) Ltd, have already been done, project director Mukit Alam Khan told the FE on Thursday.

The plant, sited at Khurushkul in the country's far south-east near Cox's Bazar beach, has been synchronised with the national power grid.

It is currently supplying around 15-20 MW of electricity on a test run.

Chinese State Power Investment Corporation and Wuling Power Corporation are investing an estimated $117 million in the project.

A total of 22 wind turbines, from China's Envision-Energy, are built on 110-metre tall towers, to generate 3.0 MW each of electricity.

A wind speed of 3.0 metres/second is required to generate electricity from wind. The full capacity of a plant can be utilised when the wind speed will be around 9.0 metres/second or above.

The average wind speed on the project site is around 5.5 metres/second and it drops slightly in winter.

The Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) will purchase power from the wind plant at 12 US cents per unit (1 kWh) for 18 years from the starting date of its commercial operation.

Annual power production from the plant is expected at 145.70 million kWh, according to the project director.

Power China Chengdu Engineering, China Hydropower Construction Group, International Engineering Co Ltd and Fujian Electric Power Engineering Company are the engineering, procurement and construction contractors of the project.

Official data shows Bangladesh's total power-generation capacity was around 21,710 MW at the end of 2022.

Around 51 per cent of the capacity is natural gas-fired, while 27 per cent is from furnace oil, 6.0 per cent from gasoil or diesel and only 2.0 per cent from hydropower and solar, with another 5.0 per cent imported from India.

The share of wind energy is almost zero.

The under-trial Cox's Bazar plant is, however, not the first wind-based power facility in Bangladesh.

The country built its first wind-powered plant near the dam along the Muhuri river in south-eastern Feni district 18 years ago in 2005.

The state-backed BPDB built the 0.9 MW plant.

The second 2.0 MW plant was built three years later on Kutubdia island in the Bay of Bengal in Cox's Bazar.

But both plants lie idle for lack of supervision and interest from the power development board.

Apart from the trio, Bangladesh has been working to install around a dozen more such plants with a total 1,000-MW generation capacity, said Power Division joint secretary Nirod C Mondol, who looks after renewable energy issues.

Three more under-construction wind plants with a cumulative capacity of 102 MW in Sirajganj, Bagerhat and Chuadanga districts are due for completion by 2024.

The process of selecting contractors for a 50-MW wind project in Chandpur Sadar and a 30-MW plant in Feni are also in the pipeline.

Moreover, tariff negotiations are well underway to build a 200-MW plant at Chokoria in Chattogram, Mr Mondol told the FE.

The technical evaluation for building a 100-MW plant at Banshkhali is underway. Another proposed 100-MW plant in Patuakhali will be sent to the evaluation committee soon, he mentioned.

The US-DK Green Energy also submitted a proposal to Power Division for an extension of its power plant to double the capacity to 120 MW, said Mr Mondol.

In July, a joint venture of two Danish renewable energy investors and developers-Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) and Copenhagen Offshore Partners (COP)-also submitted a $1.3-billion investment proposal to develop a commercial wind-based project offshore.

Initially, it aims to produce around 500-MW power.

Once implemented, this offshore project will be the first of its kind in Bangladesh, and possibly in South Asia, enabling a technology transfer that would accelerate the learning curve for this nascent industry and reduce barriers to entry for future projects.

The findings of a preliminary study suggest that hundreds of direct and indirect jobs could be created during the construction phase, in addition to dozens of permanent positions during the 30-year operational phase of the project.

The Danish giants have proposed Summit Group, a leading infrastructure operator and developer in South Asia and the largest independent power producer in Bangladesh, to join the consortium.

The US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NERL) conducted a study on Bangladeshi wind energy potential several years back.

The 2018 study 'Assessing the Wind Energy Potential in Bangladesh: Enabling Wind Energy Development with Data Products' said Bangladesh's wind energy potential is at least around 30,000 MW.

"Preliminary results demonstrate that for wind speeds of 5.75-7.75 metres/second, there are more than 20,000 square kilometres of land with gross wind potential of over 30,000 MW," it concluded.

The study found that nine locations across the country had an average wind speed of 5.0-6.0 metres/second at a height of over 60 to 80 metres above ground level.

"We're doing a feasibility study to build a number of new wind-based power projects on the basis of the NERL study," Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority (SREDA) chairman Munira Sultana told the FE.

PM's energy adviser Dr Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury also identified wind power as one of the energy sources to meet the country's future energy demand against the backdrop of volatile fossil-fuel prices globally.

The US-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) calls for an urgent overhaul of Bangladesh's power-sector development with greater integration of renewable energy to enhance its energy security.

The country should aim for renewables to make up 40 per cent of its total power-generation capacity by 2041, a target set by the government, said Shafiqul Alam, an energy finance analyst at IEEFA.

"While once there was concern over the possibility of utilising wind to generate energy in Bangladesh attributable to the perception that we don't have sufficient wind speed, later on, studies substantiated that Bangladesh could take advantage of wind speed in the coastal belt."

"We're now concentrating on the utilisation of renewable energy," said Mohammad Hossain, director general of the state-run Power Cell.

"The Russian invasion of Ukraine has been an eye-opener, making us want to streamline local energy resources instead of depending on imports alone to meet the country's energy demand."

The big thing is that renewable energy exploitation does not require any import of energy, said Mr Hossain. Bangladesh has been facing an acute dollar crisis since the beginning of the war in February 2022 mostly due to its over-reliance on energy imports to meet domestic demand.

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