Minister of National Infrastructures Benjamin Ben-Eliezer today signed another license for a private electricity producer to build a pumped storage power plant - for a 220-megawatt power plant to be built in Haifa by Nochi Dankner's IDB Holding Corp. Ltd. (TASE:IDBH) unit Clal Industries and Investments Ltd. (TASE: CII).
The power plant will cost an estimated $250 million to build. Clal Industries must still obtain building and other permits.
The power plant is scheduled to be completed by 2015. The upper part of the plant will be located at the Nesher Israel Cement Enterprises Ltd. quarry on Mount Carmel, and the lower part of the plant will be at the company's premises by the Kishon River at the base of the mountain. Nesher is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Clal Industries.
This is the second license for a pumped storage power plant. The first was granted to a consortium of Electra Ltd. (TASE: ELTR), Ortam Sahar Ltd. (TASE:ORTM), and Merhav MNF Ltd., owned by Joseph Maiman, to build a 300-megawatt plant on Mount Gilboa.
Pumped storage technology generates electricity by exploiting the difference in altitude between the upper water reservoir and the lower power plant. The technology is feasible due to the difference in electricity rates between peak and off-peak hours. Water is pumped to the upper reservoir at night, during off-peak electricity rates, and sent back down to generate power by gravitation during daytime peak electricity rates. The technology's advantage lies in the increased flexibility it gives the electricity grid, by generating power during peak demand at fairly low cost.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on March 23, 2009
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