Istanbul (Platts)--9Aug2012/749 am EDT/1149 GMT
Turkey's state coal authority TKI Thursday opened a tender for the development of the Harmanalani and Davutlar coal fields and the construction and operation of a power plant to burn the lignite produced by the fields. In documents released on the TKI Internet site the authority announced that a license is on offer to extract coal from the fields for 30 years from the commissioning of the power plant, with bids to be submitted by November 1. No capacity was given for the plant to be constructed but it should be capable of generating a minimum of 1.62 GWh a year with bids limited to companies with experience of both coal mining and of operation of coal-fired power plants of 270 MW and over. Bids are to be made on the level of royalty to be paid to TKI per KWh of power produced. The Harmanalani and Davutlar coal fields lie within the Keles coal field near Bursa in northwest Turkey with the former covering 6,668 hectares and the latter 6,039 hectares. The tender is the second to have been opened since Turkish energy minister Taner Yildiz announced that Turkey plans to open tenders for 6-7 GW of new coal fired power plant this year and to have between 17-18 GW of coal fired plant operating by 2023.--David O'Byrne, newsdesk@platts.com --Edited by Jonathan Dart, jonathan_dart@platts.com