Premier opens country’s large-scale Wind Power Project

By Chaturanga Samarawickrama   

Sri Lanka’s first large-scale Wind Power Project (WPP) constructed in the Southern coast of Mannar was declared open by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa yesterday.   

The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) was awarded the Mannar Wind Power Project (MWPP) contract to construct 30 state-of-the-art, wind-assisted power-generating turbines, the Ministry said.   

They said each turbine was estimated to generate 3.45 MW of power and the total installed capacity of this windmill farm was 103.5 MW. “This is a culmination of a long-term effort by the CEB to develop wind power in major scale, exploiting the monsoonal wind pattern in Sri Lanka,” it is said.  The CEB, in this project, intends to harness power from wind in large scale on the same lines as it did by generating hydro power during the last century. Total investment for the windmill farm is approximately US$ 141 million.   

Once commissioned, the Mannar Windmill Farm could supply more than 380 million units of clean electricity to the national grid annually. Electricity from this project can be generated for less than 5.0 US Cents per kw/hr. One of the major benefits of this project is its ability to displace large amount of fossil fuel-based electricity generation and thereby avoiding emissions amounting to a massive 285,000 metric tonnes of Co2 to the environment, annually. 

• Once commissioned, the Mannar Windmill Farm could supply more than 380  million units of clean electricity to the national grid annually.  Electricity from this project can be generated for less than 5.0 US  Cents per kw/hr