The technology group Wärtsilä’s long-standing preferred-supplier status with Lucky Cement, one of Pakistan’s leading producers and exporters of cement, has resulted in yet more orders for engine generating sets. Lucky Cement’s Pezu power plant in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province already operates with ten Wärtsilä dual-fuel engines supplying the electricity needed to run the production. With new cement lines installed, an additional three Wärtsilä 34DF dual-fuel engines, each with an output of 10 MW, have been ordered to provide the additional power required for the power plant without grid connection. The orders were placed in April, August, and November 2020.The Wärtsilä engines are capable of operating on various fuels, but will be fuelled primarily by natural gas, the cleanest of all fossil fuels producing notably lower levels of emissions than coal or oil. Furthermore, the Pezu facility is a combined cycle power plant, utilising steam generated from a waste heat recovery boiler to produce additional electricity, thus saving energy that would otherwise be wasted. In combined cycle mode, power plants can achieve efficiency levels much higher than conventional plants.

“It is important for large cement producers to have operational flexibility to run the power plant on multiple fuels in case the gas supply is interrupted, or whenever otherwise required. Wärtsilä’s multi-fuel power generating technology provides the kind of flexibility that we need for an efficient and reliable power supply. The cement plant is relying purely on the power plant with Wärtsilä gensets supplying the power,” commented Syed Noman Hasan, Executive Director at Lucky Cement.

“There is no better endorsement of customer satisfaction than repeat orders, and we are delighted to have been once again selected to provide generating power for the Pezu plant. The efficiency and flexibility of the Wärtsilä 34DF engine promotes both reliability and environmental sustainability, making it an extremely popular choice for power plant applications around the world,” said Alexandre Eykerman, Energy Business Director, Middle East, Wärtsilä.

In addition to the engines, the Wärtsilä scope includes waste heat recovery boilers needed to produce the steam, which in turn will power the steam turbines for electricity generation in combined cycle mode. The first Wärtsilä engine is being delivered already in November 2020 and is expected to become fully operational in January 2021. The remaining two engines will be delivered by March 2021, and will become operational in May 2021.

The relationship between Wärtsilä and Lucky Cement is very strong, with five orders for Wärtsilä generating sets having been placed for delivery to different countries since 2019. Lucky Cement Pakistan has a production capacity of 12.15 million tons per annum.