Tadmax: Pulau Indah power plant will start commercial operations in 2023

PETALING JAYA: Tadmax Resources Bhd is confident that its 1,000-1,200MW combined cycle gas-fired power plant in Pulau Indah will not experience a delay with the participation of Korea Electric Power Corp (Kepco), but is ahead of schedule and fast-tracked to meet its commercial operation date on Jan 1, 2023.

Tadmax executive director Datuk Noel John ( pix) said it is more than halfway through its negotiations with the Single Buyer Department, a government entity that prepares power purchase agreements on behalf of Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB), Petronas Gas Bhd for the gas supply as well as transmission works agreement with TNB Transmission. It has also engaged with banks for financing.

“In one year, we’ve moved fast because we’ve brought a team into our power sector. Others will wait one to three months and engage consultants but we’ve preempted all that by having our own team and we got the consultants on board. We’ve moved quite far ahead. We don’t want to delay, we want to get it faster,” he told a press conference yesterday.

Moreover, he said Tadmax is listed as a Committed Generation Projects for 2023 in the Peninsular Malaysia Outlook 2017 report published by the Energy Commission (ST).

“We’ve passed the first milestone and we’re moving on to the second milestone by Aug 1, 2018,” said Noel.

Tadmax is to submit technical and financial proposals for the implementation of the project by Aug 1, 2018. The first milestone saw Tadmax submitting detailed feasibility study reports, proof of land ownership and a commitment bond of RM10 million.

It is estimated to open bids in excess of RM2 billion for the plant and has shortlisted eight foreign engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contractors in accordance with EC guidelines.

On Tadmax, which has no experience in the power sector, Noel said some of the big major energy producers today also started without any experience in the power sector, and that “experience” comes from the people in the company.

“The company has no experience, the people have experience. We’ve set-up a technical team headed by Datuk George Mathews with his team of engineers who have together (in total) more than 100 years of experience in the power sector.”

George previously worked for utility companies including TNB, Pöyry Energy Sdn Bhd, WorleyParsons Sdn Bhd and TNB Engineering Corp Sdn Bhd. His team consists of ex-TNB engineers and even those from the Singapore power sector.

“That team will continue to be strengthened in 2018 as we move towards milestone two and into the construction period.”

Noel said Tadmax is more than capable, together with its technical consultants like Fichtner, to do the technical evaluation and deliver this project to the ST.

“Kepco can value add, improve, strengthen our technical and financial capability in making sure this project is successfully implemented. They (Kepco) have already started engaging with us around March/April last year,” said Noel.

Kepco is South Korea’s largest stateowned public utility company of which 51% is owned by the government of South Korea, with assets of US$147 billion (RM615.9 billion) and annual revenue of US$50 billion. It intends to secure a 25% stake in the consortium Tadmax Indah Power Sdn Bhd upon the successful implementation of the joint development agreement, subject to the EC’s approval.

He said it is confident that this project will provide adequate returns to shareholders in the future.

Tadmax closed 4.11% higher at 38 sen yesterday with 16.12 million shares traded.