Power

Bangladesh is progressing through a phase of development where automation is the key to its economy and business. As the country continues to industrialize the importance of power generation and electricity supply becomes a key government priority.

At present, 47% of the total population of Bangladesh is enjoying the electric facilities. As of April 2010, the total numbers of transmission and distribution lines are recorded to 8,359 km and 266,460 km respectively. However, 53,281 villages have been electrified so far. In Bangladesh per capita generation is 220 KW hr which is comparatively lower than other developed countries in the world.

Electricity is a key ingredient for the socio-economic development of the country. The government has given top priority to development of the sector considering its importance in the overall development of the country. The government has set the goal of providing electricity to all citizens by 2021. Adequate and reliable supply of electricity is an important pre-requisite for attracting both domestic and foreign investment.

As the power sector is a capital-intensive industry, huge investments are required in order to generate addition to the capacity. Competing demands on the government resources and declining levels of external assistance from multilateral and bilateral donor agencies constrained the potential for public investment in the power sector. Recognizing these trends, the government of Bangladesh amended its industrial policies to enable private investment in the power sector.

The Power Cell, created under the Power Division of Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources, received the mandate to lead private power development. The government is strongly committed to attract private investment for installing new power generation capacity on build-own-operate basis.

Orion has already completed 3 units of 100MW each HFO based Power Plants and is distributing to the national grid on a regular basis. A similar Plant and about 1300 MW Coal Fired IPPs are under construction. Orion has recently won another 3 coal based about 1600MW and a 850 MW LNG based IPPs. With these, ORION has become the pioneer in private sector power generation of the country.