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Oman’s Renewables Sector to Reduce Power Sector Gas Demand to 83%

Oman’s longstanding dependence on natural gas a fuel resource for electricity generation is projected to decline to 83 per cent by 2024 — down from around 100 per cent presently — on the back of a raft of solar photovoltaic, wind and coal-based power schemes due to come on stream over the next 7 years.

 

The resultant savings in natural gas are largely in trend with a strategy spearheaded by the Oman Power and Water Procurement Company (OPWP) — the sole offtaker of electricity and desalinated water output — to achieve a minimum 10 per cent contribution from renewables to the nation’s aggregate power demand.

 

Plans for new generation capacity based on clean-coal technology, as well as significant enhancements in the efficiency of newly built gas-based power plants, are also helping ease Oman’s dependence on natural gas as a primary fuel resource, according to a high-level executive of OPWP.

 

“We have the mandate to put a lid on the growth in gas requirements, which have been rising very fast over the last 10 years,” said Brian Wood — Planning & Economics Director, OPWP. “But with renewable energy and the coal project envisaged at the end of the current 7-Year (timeframe), we can restrict growth in gas demand to around 1 per cent per year on average. This is mainly due to the following factors: energy efficiency, the shift to reverse osmosis in water desalination — which allows us to change the despatch in power plants, and new energy-efficient plants coming up in Ibri and Suhar.” Speaking at a forum held in the city recently, Wood said the new Independent Power Projects (IPPs) in various stages of development and operation in Sur, Suhar, Barka and Ibri have helped significantly reduce the gas requirement per megawatt-hour of power production.

 

“By the end of 2024, if all our plans come to fruition, natural gas presently responsible for 100 per cent of power production (in the main grids) will drop to about 83 per cent by 2024. A further 12 per cent will come from renewables, and the rest from coal,” he stated.

 

Under plans unveiled by OPWP recently, the Sultanate is looking at developing 2,650 MW of solar photovoltaic and wind-based capacity by 2024. This is in addition to around 3,000 MW of coal-based capacity planned by 2030.

 

Growth in electricity demand over the next seven years is expected to be within trends — averaging 6 per cent per year. This translates to a requirement for around 3,000 MW of additional capacity by the year 2024, up from a peak demand of just over 6000 MW presently, said Wood. “We have reduced the demand by about 300 MW over this period due to the introduction of Cost Reflective Tariffs in January 2017. We see some demand reductions as a result,” he added.

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