Mothballing of
Komati
During the mid 80's a decision was made to take out units and
later the entire Power Station was out of service, mainly because of the
following reasons:
-
Surplus
capacity
-
Increasing maintenance
costs of the older plant
-
To be able to put newly
built power stations, such as Majuba, in commercial service and make use of the
guarantee period.
Return to
service
It was also decided not to let the plant deteriorate but to
conserve it properly to return it at a later stage. The conservation process was
called mothballing.
The first plant to be
mothballed was Turbine 5 on 15 December 1987 followed by Boiler 3. The rest of
the plant was mothballed at various intervals thereafter and the last to be
mothballed was Unit 4 on 06 December 1990. Different methods were used to
prevent deterioration of the plant, such as painting, the use of vapour
corrosion inhibitors (VCI) and the passing of dehumidified air through the
boilers, turbine feed and steam circuits and the generators.
In the early 2000’s a
decision was taken to return Komati Power Station to service to meet the growing
demand of electricity. The User Requirement Specification was compiled and
approved on 14 August 2006. The units were returned to service starting with
unit 9; this unit was declared fit for Commercial Operation on the 24th of
December 2008. Unit 8 followed on 1st of March 2009. With a goal of being the
“Best return To Service Power Station By Far” and a motto of “We are Powered by
Performance”, Komati won most of the winter challenge awards for 2010. This
proved that Komati is not only the best Return to service Station by far but the
best in Production Unit Coal 3.
Komati ended up TOP in
Plant Performance in 2010 and set a new goal in 2010, and that was to “Be the
Best of the Best in Generation” More than a year later unit 7 was declared fit
for Commercial Operation on the 12th of July 2010. Unit 4 followed on 29
December 2011 and unit 5 on 3 February 2012. By the end of 2012 Komati will had
all 9 units running with a total generation capacity of 1000 MW.
Technical
details
Komati was one of the first pulverised fuel firing stations
and designed to generate 1000 MW with five units rated at 100 MW and four at 125
MW
Where is
Komati:
Komati is situated about 37km from Middelburg, 43km from Bethal and 40km
from Witbank, via Vandyksdrift.