General Electric (GE) has received a contract to supply 16 power transformers for installation onboard powerships which are being built by Karadeniz Energy Group affiliate Karpowership in Turkey.

Turkey based Karadeniz operates the powerships, also known as floating power plants, to address short term energy problems by connecting into the electricity grid immediately upon berthing.

Under the contract, GE will deliver the power transformers of 100MVA and 200MVA by the end of 2016. The company will also be responsible for the deployment, field tests and replacement part provision works.

With a total installed capacity of 1GW, the new powerships include the world's largest of its kind with 486MW capacity. They are expected to generate electricity required to power approximately 17 million households per annum.

Karpowership chairman Osman Karadeniz said: "The transmission speed of the generated electricity has become critical as the world's demand for energy increases with each passing day.

“With this vision, we, at Karpowership provide the electricity that we generate with the world's first Powerships on the sea to the countries in need.

“Producing specially-designed transformers to allow electricity transmission for variable currents in different countries, GE plays a critical role in this success.”

GE's Grid Solutions will manufacture the transformers at its power transformer factory in Gebze, Turkey.

GE Turkey president and CEO Canan Özsoy said: "We are proud to produce these transformers in our transformer factory in Gebze, one of the world's most advanced facilities in the field, contributing to the national economy by exporting 85% of its production.

“Highlighting that the opportunity to help meeting the short term electricity demands of countries quickly and cost-effectively is an important step towards providing sustainable and reliable energy for more people."

Featuring special coating to provide protection against moisture and salt impact, the transformers can be operated under different climatic conditions with degrees ranging from -20 to 50 °C.

Karpowership earlier announced plans to increase its installed power capacity to over 5000MW by the end of 2017.

Image: A Karpowership-owned powership at sea. Photo: courtesy of General Electric.