The 135MW CEL II Sihanoukville, under construction in Stung Hav, Sihanoukville, Cambodia, is the second coal-fired power plant in Cambodia to be owned and operated by Cambodia Energy Limited (CEL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Leader Energy, a company based in Malaysia.

Located in the south-west coast of Cambodia, the CEL II Sihanoukville power plant is scheduled to start feeding electricity to the national grid by the end of 2019. The power generated from the plant will be bought by Cambodia’s state-owned energy utility Electricite du Cambodge (EDC).

The new plant is expected to be the cleanest and most efficient thermal power plant in Cambodia.

CEL II Sihanoukville plant details

The new 135MW plant is being built as part of an Independent Power Producer (IPP) project secured by Leader Energy in 2016. The power station will be built-owned-operated for a tenure of 30 years by Cambodia Energy Limited II (CEL II), a project company set up by Leader Energy.

It is being constructed adjacent to the existing 100MW CEL I power plant. The CEL I power plant comprises two 50MW coal-fired generating units that came online in November 2014 and March 2015 respectively.

Plant make-up and infrastructure

The new plant will consist of a single 135MW coal-fired generating unit comprised of circulating fluidised bed (CFB) boiler, electrostatic precipitator and advanced steam turbine from GE.

It will feature GE’s advanced ultra-supercritical steam plant technology called SteamH, which will use the digital power plant software provided by Predix to enable the plant achieve the highest possible efficiency and lowest emissions.

With data available for monitoring and analysis from more than 10,000 sensor inputs across the coal energy generation facility, the operators will be able to run the power plant efficiently with lower operating cost and environmental impact.

GE, as part of the memorandum of understanding signed with Cambodia’s Ministry of Mines and Energy, also provides the Continuous Emission Monitoring System (CEMS) for tracking and analysing the emission levels of the power plant.

Contractors involved with the Cambodian thermal power plant

Toshiba Plant Systems and Services Corporation (TPSC), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japanese multi-national conglomerate Toshiba, was awarded the turnkey contract for the Sihanoukville CEL II power plant in February 2017.

TPSC’s Malaysian and Thai subsidiaries are being involved for engineering, procurement, construction, installation and testing of the plant.

GE was contracted by TPSC to supply the boiler, electrostatic precipitator and steam turbine generation systems for the coal-fired power plant in April 2017.

Finnish engineering and consulting company Pöyry was awarded a three-year owner’s engineer services contract covering project management assistance, design review, quality assurance, site supervision, quality control and commissioning services  for the CEL II coal-fired power plant in March 2017.

Commentary on Cambodian energy market

Cambodia, with a population of 1.5 million, faces electricity shortage with 19% of its villages still to be electrified as of 2016. Cambodia’s gross electricity consumption in the same year was estimated to be 7,033.15GW/h with domestic production accounting for 77.96% of it.

The country’s energy mix comprises 46.8% of hydro-power and 43.6% of coal-fired thermal power.

The CEL II Sihanoukville coal-fired plant is the first power project in Cambodia for GE as well as Toshiba. To be the first to use GE’s advanced ultra-supercritical steam plant technology in the country, the plant will serve as an example of small-sized generating units with higher efficiency and lower emissions in Cambodia.