9/18/2006

GE Energy plans $1 bln power plant in Poland -paper

General Electric Co.'s energy unit plans to invest $1 billion in a new clean coal power plant in Poland, a Polish newspaper quoted GE Energy chief executive John Krenicki as saying on Saturday. "Due to the large reserves of coal and its rising energy needs, Poland is a natural place for this investment," the Rzeczpospolita daily quoted Krenicki as saying during a meeting in the United States with Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.

The company was not immediately available for comment. The paper reported the plant would have a generation capacity of around 900 MW, enough to provide for some 250,000 homes, and would be financed in part by European Union funds.

It said a site has yet to be selected for the plant, which would be constructed over the next five years.

General Electric's Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt said earlier this year he expected the company would receive about $5 billion in orders for clean coal power plants by 2010.

GE has said that integrated gasification combined cycle technology is on the verge of being commercially viable. IGCC coal plants turn coal into a cleaner-burning gas, thus reducing emissions.

Poland is still struggling to liberalise its power sector, most of whose capacity is tied up in long-term power agreements signed in the 1990s to make possible modernisation of outdated communist-era infrastructure.

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