Suppliers owed K700mil – The National

**The Dirio gas power plant on the outskirts of Port Moresby is another independent power producer. – Pictures supplied**

By PETER ESILA
PNG Power Limited currently owes independent power producers (IPP) more than K700 million in electricity bills, and also needs capital, according to the IPP industry group.
Chairman David Burbidge said the group included NiuPower, Dirio, POSCO Lae, PNG Forest Products Hydro, Edevu (PNG Hydro Development) and the New Britain Palm Oil Ltd.
“Dirio and NiuPower are still having to buy gas. POSCO is caught up in the Puma debacle and having to absorb additional fuel costs” he said.
“Sooner or later something is going to give.
“This is not a criticism of the PNG Power management. They are doing their best but need a significant injection of capital.
“PNG Power is spending more than it receives in income, and even if the plans they have to collect outstanding debts from Government and stop the illegal connections, there is still not enough revenue to pay debts and maintain the network.
“We are seeing more and more outages each day and PNG Power simply does not have the working capital to do what is really needed,” Burbidge said.
The independent power producers account for more than 60 per cent of the electricity on the Port Moresby and Ramu (Madang) grids.
“So we are an integral part of the system now,” he said.
“The only outcome, if nothing is done to inject much needed capital into the business, is a total system failure where the generators are bankrupted and the network suffers catastrophic failure.
“Imagine the cost to the economy. That day is not far off.”
He said Edevu had been generating power since last October and was receiving “small payments”, with NG Power “falling behind already”.
Meanwhile, PNG Power Ltd yesterday notified consumers in the national Capital District and Central that emergency load-shedding planned for today had been cancelled. “We have sufficient (capacity) to supply all our customers.”