Qatar signs deals to build bln dlr power plant

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DOHA (AFP) - Gas-rich Qatar on Sunday signed a series of deals to build a 3.8-billion-dollar (2.5-billion-euro) desalination and power plant part-owned by Japanese and French firms, a statement said.

The facility will be completed in 2011 and will be owned and operated by Ras Girtas Power Company, the statement from the Qatar General Electricity and Water Corporation, which will purchase the power and water from the plant, said.

The Ras Girtas Power Company is jointly owned by the Qatar Electricity and Water Company (45 percent), a consortium of Japan's Mitsui and France's Suez Energy International (40 percent) and Qatar Petroleum (15 percent).

The plant will have eight gas turbine generators, eight heat recovery steam generators, four steam turbine generators and 10 desalination units.

Officials from Qatar and the companies involved in the project signed deals to build the facility at a cost of 14 billion Qatari rials (3.8 billion dollars).

Mitsui is the main contractor for the plant, which will produce 2,730 megawatts of electricity per hour and will have a capacity of 63 million gallons (286 million litres) a day.

This will give the Gulf Arab state, currently in the midst of a construction boom, a total power generating capacity of 9,000 megawatts and a desalination capacity of more than 320 million gallons (1.4 billion litres) per day.