The spring snow-melt season is likely to bring frequent equipment failures at the Krasnoyarsk hydroelectric plant in Siberia, the plant’s director general, Sergei Kaminsky, has told the RIA Novosti agency.
Kaminsky said that a modernisation programme launched several years ago was stopped because of funding shortages, and equipment failure had twice left the plant in a vulnerable position. When the Yenisei river was high in the snow-melt season more failures should be expected, he said.
The plant’s entire production is procured by the Krasnoyarskenergo company, but the company owes the plant around US$9M for past electricity supplies.
An issue of stock, which would have raised US$18M for a new modernisation programme, had also been suspended by the Russian government’s securities commission.