Origin, Engie Sign Deals to Cover Australia Power Needs

Source: http://ift.tt/2gh4v9v --- Thursday, March 30, 2017
Australian producer and marketer Origin Energy has signed two agreements March 29 to boost natural gas supplies to French utility Engie. The first is to underpin the operation of Pelican Point power station’s second generation unit. The second is a pure gas sales agreement to make more natural gas available for Engie's customers in South Australia and Victoria. Under the Pelican Point agreement, Origin will supply gas to Engie-run Pelican Point in South Australia and for a fixed charge will gain access to 240 MW of electricity production, to be used by Origin to supply customers in South Australia. Origin said the arrangement would run from July 2017 to June 2020 inclusive and would better position the plant to support peak demand during the 2017 and 2018 summer periods and beyond. Engie also said March 29 that it would spend over A$40mn upgrading a second turbine at Pelican Point that had been withdrawn from the market since April 2015. The 479 MW plant is 72%-owned by Engie and 28% by Japan's Mitsui. Under the separate gas sales agreement, Origin will sell 8 petajoules (213.6mn m 3 ) of gas to Engie in Australia spanning the 2018 and 2019 calendar years to help it meet the needs of the latter's customers. Pelican Point power plant (Photo credit: Engie) Origin CEO, Frank Calabria said, “The power outages in South Australia reinforce the need for sufficient gas-fired power generation to be readily available, especially when wind ...

from Australia http://ift.tt/2njhwiu