Norochcholai out again: CEB may now seek help from India

The Lakvijaya Coal Power Plant in Norochcholai has been shut down for repairs again -- the third time in five weeks.

The plant was shut down at 9.15 pm on Friday “due to high conductivity of boiler water”, Ceylon Electricity Board spokesman Senajith Dasanayake said.

This was the result of one of the 16,000 pipes transporting sea water to cool the plants springing a leak. This problem had occurred several times in the past, and CEB sources said 105 pipes were already damaged.

The pipes are divided into two portions of 8,000 each and are contained inside thick iron “tunnels” or boiler drums. After spending weeks trying to locate a previous leak -- and failing -- the CEB and the Chinese contractor imported an ultrasound machine to do the job. The same equipment was used this week to find the new crack.

The sources said the CEB planned to study the problem in greater detail this time. “We are trying to do more tests,” one official said. “They are thin pipes and sand can go inside. We have seen this happen in the past and we want to see whether this might be a reason for the pipes eroding.”

Another possibility is that the quality of the titanium used to construct these pipes is low. “We have also told the Chinese contractor to do some tests,” the official said, adding that the CEB was again considering seeking Indian expertise to detect the faults in the condensers.

Lakvijaya Deputy General Manager D.C.J. Saram said the CEB had two options. It could leave the plant inoperative till all the tests were done or, if Indian assistance was solicited, it could restart the unit and shut it down when help arrived.