The Arab Shipbuilding and Repair Yard Co (ASRY) and Centrax have come together to develop a floating power station.
Guy West, director at Centrax, says, "We identified four needs: natural disasters, hostile environments; global deregulation of the electricity industry; and growth in renewables."
The Trent power barge is capable of 125MW - an optimal size for the markets cited, and for deployments anywhere in the world. The Trent is the most powerful aero-derivative engine in the world, and comes with the Rolls-Royce global support network.. The lifecycle of the barge itself is expected to be up to 40 years.
The ASRY-Centrax power bargeCentrax is strategically focused on geographic diversification, market diversification, and product diversification. Guy cites work in Nigeria, on the Niger, as a key prospective deployment.
Peter Thornton, director at ASRY, one of the largest shipbuilding and repair yards in the world, says, "The power barges are being built at a newly expanded fabrication facility in Bahrain. The long-term objective is to have an operational headquarters for the power barges."
Palitha Jagathpriya, head of new build and project engineering at ASRY, described the power barge at launch; at 82m long, 28m breadth, and 5.9m depth - with a complement of ten persons. Palitha says, "This is a compact size for this kind of barge."
The barge can be operated on either liquid fuel or gas. Its main equipment includes a turbine control and monitoring package, and three black-start generators. Palitha adds that a helipad has been added as an option.
The Trent, which also powers the Boeing 777 and the Airbus A380, is the most efficient gas turbine available. Jim Finley, executive vice-president at Rolls-Royce's energy business, says, "The fundamental technology that sits in the Trent turbine provides the very highest power density in the market today, with the very highest levels of thermal efficiency."
