Middle East’s largest thermal power plant comes on stream in Iran

A thermal power plant, with a generation capacity of 2.8 gigawatts, was officially inaugurated on Tuesday in Pakdasht, a city near Tehran. The project started in 2003 and cost €270 million plus 5 trillion rials to complete, IRIB reported.

The facility, which is the largest thermal power plant in the Middle East, increases the national electricity generation capacity by 6 percent.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad attended the inauguration ceremony.

At present, Iran’s power generation capacity stands at 67GW and it is projected to hit 70GW by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2013).

Sixteen new power stations, with a total capacity of 2.6GW, have come on stream in the current Iranian calendar year.

Currently, Iran provides electricity to Turkey, Armenia, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Iran also plans to connect the national power grid to Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Lebanon, and India in the future.