India's biggest power-equipment maker, Bharat Heavy Electricals along with GE, has won a contract worth Rs2,200 crore from ONGC Tripura Power Co. outbidding French giant Alstom's Indian subsidiary, in an global competitive bid for setting up a combined-cycle power plant on turnkey basis.

ONGC Tripura Power Co. Ltd. is a joint venture between ONGC, IL&FS and the government of Tripura, which has undertaken the construction of two combined cycle modules of 363.3 MW each, with a gross plant output of 726.6 MW at Pallatana in the Udaipur district of Tripura.ONGC has 50-per cent equity in the company with the remaing being with the other two project promoters.

Earlier in July BHEL had outbid the joint venture of Larsen & Toubro and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries for the Rs2,500-crore order from Andhra Pradesh Power Generation Corporation Ltd to provide boilers for its 1,600 MW Krishnapatnam power project.

ONGC owns significant natural gas reserves in the North Eastern state of Tripura, which are yet to be commercially developed due to the low industrial demand in the north eastern region.

Since the complexities of logistics and attendant costs limit the economic viability of transportation of gas to other parts of the country where gas is in short supply, ONGC proposes to develop the 726.6 MW combined cycle gas turbine thermal power plant at Pallatana close to its gas fields in Tripura and supply power to the power deficit areas of the north east, thus optimally utilising the gas from Tripura.

The scope of the order entails, design, engineering, manufacture, supply, erection and commissioning of two frame 9FA Gas Turbine Generator sets, two steam turbine generator sets and two heat recovery steam generators.

These are supplied with state of the art controls and instrumentation, associated auxiliaries and balance of plant, in addition to complete civil works and spares.

The first block will be completed in 42 months and the second block will be finished in 45 months, a tight schedule considering the critical transportation route through the north eastern states of India.

The gas generation is part of the transmission project to connect Pallatana, the generation site, in Tripura to Bongaigaon in Assam over 650km, using a 400 kV D/C transmission system.

BHEL said in a statement, ''On commissioning, the project is expected to transform the power scenario of the entire northeastern region of India and act as a catalyst for rapid economic development in the region.''

For evacuating power from generators, a trunk transmission line is being developed by North East Transmission Company Ltd, a joint venture between Power Grid Corporation Ltd, ONGC Tripura Power and the state governments of the north eastern region.

The inter-state and intra-state sub-transmission system and the distribution system within the north eastern states will be developed by Power Grid Corporation as the central transmission utility.

This is the fifth order bagged by BHEL involving advance Class Frame 9FA Gas Turbines.

BHEL has earlier won similar EPC contracts from Pragati Power Corporation Limited (PPCL) for a 1371 MW CCPP at Bawana in Delhi, from GSPC Pipavav Power Company Limited (GPPC) for a 700 MW CCPP at Pipavav in the coastal Saurashtra region, from Gujarat State Energy Generation Limited (GSEG) for a 350 MW CCPP at Hazira and from Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) for a 345 MW CCPP at Nagothane in Maharashtra.

BHEL has increased its manufacturing capacity to 10,000 MW per annum, which is being further enhanced to 15,000 MW per annum in the next two years at a total investment of Rs 4,200 crore.