Iraq Says Six International Companies Compete For Anbar Power Plant

AMMAN (Zawya Dow Jones)--Iraq said Saturday that six international companies have submitted bids to build a 1,500-megawatt power plant in the central Iraqi province of Anbar.

"The competing companies are Italy's Saipem SpA, Greece-based Metka (METKK.AT), South Korea's Hyundai Engineering Co. (00720.SE), Turkey's Gama and a consortium consists of Italy's Techint Engineering and Turkey's Calik," Musaab Al Mudaris, the Iraqi electricity ministry's spokesman, said in a statement.

The tender committee at the ministry will study the offers and submit a recommendation to the ministry within one month, he said. "One of these companies or consortium will be awarded the contract," he added.

Al Mudaris said the power project, which will be carried out on a turnkey basis, will be completed within 33 months from the start of work. Two units of the power station will be operated by gas, while the remaining two will be operated by other fuel.

Iraq, which suffers from an acute power shortage, hopes to at least double its power generation capacity, which stands at only 6,500 megawatts--less than half of the country's actual electricity requirements.

Nine years after the U.S.-led invasion, Iraq's national grid provides only a few hours of power each day during summer when temperatures soar to 50 degrees Celsius.

The ministry last year opened bids to build seven large power plants across the country that could boost its power generating capacity by 4,000 MW. Most of these projects were awarded earlier this year.

- By Hassan Hafidh; Dow Jones Newswires; [phone]; [e-mail]

Copyright (c) 2012 Dow Jones & Co.