Work for giant Kuri-Gongri hydro project picks up pace

SILIGURI: With commencement of real time water discharge measurement, survey for the largest Hydroproject in Bhutan has picked up pace. With capacity of 2,640 megawatt Kuri-Gongri hydropower project is going to be the largest contributor in fulfilling Bhutan’s commitment of developing 10,000 MW extra power mainly to feed India by 2020.
“We’ve placed gauge posts to measure the actual river discharge that is too important for entire planning for any particular hydroproject. This puts the pre-field work for the project into a new phase. The dynamics in water level, rising at highest level during Monsoon, is also very important to find out. That will be the very basis in determining height of the dam, the backbone of whole project,” said officials engaged in preparation of the survey.

The survey officially began following an agreement between the department of hydropower and power systems (DHPS) of Bhutan and Water and Power consultancy services (WAPCOS) of India signed on April 25th. An office manned with engineers and workers has also been deployed at the project site in Bhutan to carry out the survey.

With its successful completion, this project is going to be the most prized power generation unit yielding over 10,000 Million units, more than double of the famed 2,080 MW American ‘Hoover Dam’ that generates only around 4,200 million units a year. Undoubtedly, this will be the largest contributor to Bhutan’s power supply commitment to India.

Showing importance of Bhutan’s commitment to India, Dasho Tsering Wangda, Consul General of Bhutan in India, said earlier, “Now Bhutan’s priority is to fulfill its commitment to India by establishing the planned power projects.”

According to Bhutan Department of Hydroelectricity officials, Kuri Gongri was earlier planned as a run of the river project without large water storage and the turbines to run on the continuously flowing river. But later it was decided to be converted to a reservoir based one.

The approximate capital cost of the new project would be around Nu 200 Billion , (Eqv. INR 200 Billion) including loan interest for the construction period.