Natural Gas transmission interlude to cost Thailand 1 billion Baht

by Usa Pichai
Wednesday, 16 September 2009 20:26

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) - Natural Gas transmission from Burma and the Thai Gulf has been disrupted due to a technical snag, with damages estimated at 1 billion Baht for Thailand.

The Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand has said that the pipeline from the Yetagun field of Burma was shut down for more than nine hours on September 13 and seven hours on September 12. Meanwhile, a pipeline from the Malaysia-Thailand Joint Development Area (JDA) was shut down for two hours on September 13 and five hours on the previous day.

Yetagun’s natural gas is fuel for Thailand’s largest power plant located in Ratchaburi, Western Province of Thailand and the JDA pipeline is vital for the Channa power plant in the Southern Province.

An estimated 2,000 megawatts or 10 per cent of the country’s requirement of electricity suffered due to the gas shortage during the weekend.

Wirat Kanchanapibun, spokesperson of EGAT, said the incidents had given rise to concerns regarding the energy security in Southern Thailand.

The EGAT has solved the problem by buying electricity from Malaysia to the tune of 150 megawatts and also by generating electricity from the hydropower dam in Surat Thani Province and from the fuel oil power plant at Ratchaburi Province. A total of 240 megawatts has been generated for the Southern Province.

Moreover, EGAT decided to take a risk, by releasing water from the Srinakarin Dam in Kanchanaburi Province, close to the Burmese border to generate power.

Last month, due to the gas pipeline leakage, EGAT decided to release water from the Srinakarin Dam, which resulted in flooding of large areas and severely affected hundreds of local villagers.

The total estimated expenditure due to gas stoppage is likely to amount to 1 billion Baht, an official from EGAT opined.

Panu Sutthirat, Manager of the Natural Gas Supply Department of Petroleum Authority of Thailand (currently the PTT Public Co. Ltd.) denied that the company was responsible for the transmission from both sources, “Natural gas transmission is the responsibility of Petronas Corp. The problem at Yetagun is because of changing of the oil rig. PTT Plc used another source to substitute the electricity production, but could not cover the whole amount which was the actual deficit due to the failure,” he said.

Manoon Siriwan, a Thai independent energy expert, said that the electricity generation of Thailand was at risk because of 70% dependence on natural gas.

“Even Malaysia and Indonesia have higher natural gas reserves than Thailand, but they also use other sources to produce electricity to decrease the risk. In addition, recently all kinds of power plant projects have been disrupted in Thailand,” according to a report in the Thai website Manager.

In Thailand, several power plant projects have been disrupted by local villagers, due to fear of environmental hazards, including a coal power plant and biomass (bio-fuel) power plant.

However, the case has drawn reactions from environmentalists, who apprehend that it would lead to more governmental investments in mega projects, to serve energy demands, particularly hydropower projects in neighbouring countries like both Laos and Burma.