The third meeting of the Fast Track Project Monitoring Committee will be held today which is likely to include the ‘Materbari 2×600 MW ultra super critical coal-fired power project’ as a fast track project in addition to the existing six fast track projects.
According to sources at the Economic Relations Division (ERD), this mega project is set to be included in the fast track list at the committee’s today’s meeting to be chaired by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, also the chair of the committee.
The meeting will be held at the Prime Minister’s Office at 11:00 am, they said.
On August 12 last year, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) approved the country’s most expensive Matarbari project involving TK 35,984.46 crore.
Coal Power Generation Company Bangladesh Limited (CPGCBL) under the Power Division will implement the project at Matarbari in Moheshkhali upazila of Cox’s Bazar aiming to address the power deficiency in the country as well as ensuring uninterrupted power supply, ensuring the country’s economic development and improving the living standard of people.
Under the project, there will be two coal-based power plants each having power generation capacity of 600 MW of power. The entire project is scheduled to be completed by June 2023, according to the project documents.
Already, some 1,500 acres of land have been acquired for the project while the appointment of consultant for the project is at the final stage. Besides, work for erecting boundary fencing surrounding the acquired land is undergoing.
Ultra Super Critical Technology will be used at the Materbari project which would have work efficiency of 41.99 percent, which is higher than the average work efficiency of other coal -based power plants (34 percent) in Bangladesh. The work efficiency of the power plants in the USA is 36 percent.
Currently, six projects are under the Fast Track involving an estimated cost of $ 15.5 billion. Those are the Padma Multipurpose Bridge Project, construction of Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant, 2×660 MW Moitree Super Thermal Power Project (Rampal), Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit Development Project (Metro Rail), construction of LNG terminal project and Deep Sea Port.
Formed on May 22, 2013, the second meeting of the Fast Track Project Monitoring Committee was held on January 22, 2014. According to the sources, the meeting is expected to review the progress of the decisions taken in the first and second meetings of the Fast Track Project Monitoring Committee, review the latest implementation progress of the projects under the Fast Track, review the implementation progress of determining the working strategy for formulating DPP and TPP of projects, delay in approval or removing errors.
The meeting is also expected to finalise the draft anti-graft Monitoring Modality for the fast track projects for ensuring transparency in their implementation and tackling corruption and irregularities.
As per the draft Monitoring Modality, the secretaries of the ministries concerned of the fast track projects will conduct intensive monitoring during their ADP review meeting and submit the overall project activity report to the Fast Track Task Force. A procurement plan would have to be undertaken for a project while all the necessary procurements would have to be done as per the scheduled timeframe as per the Plan. All the necessary matters would have to be clearly mentioned in the tender documents and all-out efforts would have to be there to complete works as per the announced timeframe.
