Essar to buy power plant machinery from China

The Essar Group is buying power plant equipment worth about $1 billion (about Rs 3,900 crore) from China's Harbin Power for the new power plants it is building in India.

Essar will import four boiler turbo generator (BTG) packages and some other project materials for two mega power projects being set up in Jamnagar, Gujarat and Mahan in Madhya Pradesh.

Though Essar executives refused to divulge details, industry experts estimated the deal at $1 billion. The group is investing Rs 15,000 crore to set up three power plants of 1,200 MW each.

Harbin Power is one of the China's largest power plant equipment manufacturers, with an annual capacity of 30,000 MW of power plant equipment.

Essar was the first company to set up a power plant after the sector was liberalised.

With a 1,200 MW capacity plant planned in Jharkhand, Essar will have a generation capacity of 6,000 MW in five years.