Global supplier of electromechanical systems and services for hydropower plants Andritz Hydro is working on the Namibian Ruacana unit 4 extension project in consortium with energy infrastructure firm Alstom.

Andritz Hydro MD Wilhelm Karanitsch says that the company supplied the present three installed turbines for the underground hydropower station about 30 years ago and provisions were made for a fourth unit, but the full potential of the station was never developed until now.

The company is supplying the complete mechanical equipment and hydraulic steel structures, including the inlet valve, the penstock, the vertical Francis turbine and mechanical auxiliaries. Alstom is providing the generators and electrical equipment. The consortium will also carry out turnkey installation, commissioning and testing of the unit, which is expected to start commercial operation in 2012.

Andritz Hydro has been involved in the African power market for more than 30 years and its equipment is generating electricity in some of State-owned power utility Eskom’s hydropower stations.

The company has a contract with the South African power utility to upgrade all the control systems at its hydropower stations on a cooperation basis. The power utility and Andritz Hydro will each carry out certain components of work, depending on the different projects. The company will also train Eskom employees to work with the systems and improve standards of operation and maintenance.

Further, power utility Kenya Electricity Generating Company has awarded a contract to Andritz Hydro to install a third 24-MW turbine, and upgrade and overhaul the two other turbines at its Kindaruma dam.

The company is also working on future projects at hydropower plants in Ethiopia, Egypt, Mozambique and Nigeria, most of which will be new projects and rehabilitation projects.

Meanwhile, Andritz Hydro founded the Energy Efficiency Initiative in 2007 with Eskom, local engineering company Systems, Automation & Management, or SAM, the University of Cape Town and the Cape Peninsula University of Technology.

The initiative is supported and funded by the Austrian Development Cooperation and is a platform for electric industries and scientific institutions.