Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) has shipped 13 diesel gensets to the Yangon City Electricity Supply Board (YESB) of Myanmar.
The generators are provided as part of emergency grant aid from the Japanese government in response to Myanmar’s current power crisis. The delivery of emergency power supply is Japan’s first large-scale aid to Myanmar since the establishment of a civil administration in the country in 2011. Mitsubishi Corp said it cooperated with the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ in implementing the grant.
All 13 units, with a combined power generation capacity of about 13 MW, will be installed at the Thar Kay Ta Thermal Power Plant in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city. Yangon – Myanmar’s largest energy consumption area – has been hit by severe energy shortages due to the aging of existing power generation facilities and limited power supply capacity from hydraulic power generation during the dry season.
Demand for MHI’s emergency power generation applications has been increasing rapidly in the wake of the Japanese earthquake in March 2011. The use of these systems in the Japanese government’s overseas aid provisions is also on the rise, as illustrated by a grant of four units of 500 kW generators to the government of the Republic of Palau in May last year.