aaaaaah ya Kuwait!

Kuwait must spend $27bn on power

by Dylan Bowman and agencies on Tuesday, 29 May 2007

Kuwait needs to spend $27 billion on water and power projects over the next eight years to meet growing demand, the state’s electricity and water minister revealed yesterday.

Speaking during a special National Assembly debate on power consumption, Mohammad Al-Olaim said the country’s economic growth, coupled with wasteful consumption, was causing demand to outstrip capacity.

The minister’s comments come as Kuwait prepares for another summer of electricity cuts and water shortages as the use of air conditioning reaches its peak.

Al-Olaim said a two-and-a-half month programme of power cuts would begin in June, lasting for around one hour a day, especially during peak hours of consumption.

However, the outages could be for longer periods of time if the state experiences any problems with its six water and electricity plants, he said.

The power cuts will likely cause water shortages as well, as five of power plants are used for desalination.

Consumption until mid-July will be an average of 9,530 MW a day versus 8,630 MW a day of available production, Al-Olaim said.

The minister said the situation would improve when additional facilities come online after mid-July, but demand will still outstrip capacity. He warned residents to expect cuts to continue for the remainder of the summer.

During the special debate, MPs criticised the government for not having carried out the necessary work to increase capacity sooner and passed a recommendation calling for an acceleration of water and electricity projects.

Al-Olaim said new power plants need to be built and old ones upgraded, and that the state needs to rely more on natural gas rather than oil for fuel.

Kuwait has quantities of natural gas, which were uncovered last year, but has yet to maximise production. The government said in March it was considering an import terminal for liquefied natural gas from Iraq and Iran.

New power plants are expected to come online between 2009 and 2011 and water production will rise to 200 million gallons by 2012, according to the Ministry of Electricity and Water.

Water shortages have been highlighted as one of the biggest economic, social and environmental challenges facing Arab countries. Speaking during a conference on water resources management last week, UAE Environment and Water Minister Mohammad Saeed Al Kindi said Arab cities would face a water shortage of 100 to 133 billion cubic metres a year by 2030.


from Arabian Business:

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13386:kuwait-must-spend-27bn-on-power&Itemid=0