Qassim Mohammed, Iraq’s minister of electricity, signed the $1.4 billion agreement on Thursday in Baghdad, as Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi looked on.
According to the United Nations Development Programme, Iraqi households receive 14.6 hours of electricity daily through public or private generators, and 90 percent of households utilize private generators.
Iraq's peak electricity demand was 2.1 gigawatts in the summer and the grid is only able to supply about 1.3 gigawatts, Reuters reported last April.
The gas-turbine power plants, to be completed by 2018 in the southern provinces of Dhi Qar and Muthannah, will each have a capacity of 750 megawatts, according to GE which announced it had won the bid on January 18.
GE added under the terms of the deal that it can sustain about 1.75 gigawatts of power generation through the maintenance of six different gas-turbine power plants, enhancing Iraq’s electricity reliability and efficiency.
Additionally, under Phase II of the Power Up Plan, is a joint plan between GE and the ministry for maintenance projects, four unspecified power plants will undergo upgrades and rehabilitation to add over 580 megawatts to the national grid.
“We are pleased to be working in collaboration with the Ministry of Electricity to continue to help provide power to the people of Iraq,” wrote Steve Bolze, president and CEO of GE Power, in a press release last week. “Using GE’s expanded portfolio of technologies and solutions, this project will provide more reliable and sustainable electricity for the country to help achieve better operations and higher levels of efficiency.”
The deal with GE is also expected to create 1,500 jobs in southern Iraq, according to Abadi’s office.
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