A foreign vessel named MV Jador has arrived from Indonesia with 36,600 tonnes of coal for 1,320MW Payra Thermal Power Plant in Patuakhali.
The ship arrived late Wednesday night at Payra port in the district. The ship was being brought from outer anchorage to inner anchorage while filing this report.
Deputy Director Azizur Rahman of Payra Port Traffic Department confirmed the information.
Superintending Engineer Shah Abdul Haseeb the power plant, said after the ship reaches the inner anchorage, the coal unloading process will begin through lighter vessels. The ship will arrive at Payra thermal power station jetty on Thursday night or early Friday morning afterwards.
After that, the coal will be unloaded from the ship to the Payra thermal power station reservoir.
This is the third coal carrier ship to arrive after power generation at the Payra Thermal Power Plant was halted due to a fuel shortage over a month ago.
MV Jador, with a length of 189.99 metres and a width of 32.25 metres, left Port of Balikpapan in Indonesia about a week ago. Before this, two more ships called MV Pavo Brave and MV Athena arrived at the port with about 78,000 tonnes of coal on July 2 and June 23 respectively.
The country’s largest thermal power plant, Payra, was completely shut down on 5 June due to a fuel shortage.
Due to the failure to pay an outstanding bill of $390 million caused by a dollar shortage, production of a unit of the plant was halted on 25 May as the companies involved stopped supplying coal.
Production at the other unit continued until 5 June when it was also shut down due to coal shortage. The closure of the country’s biggest thermal power plant led to weeks of nationwide load-shedding amid the hottest summer on record.
The power plant resumed production on June 25.
