KazAzot to suspend operations due to power supply restrictions in Mangistau region

ASTANA. Aug 15 (Interfax) - Kazakhstan's KazAzot, a producer of ammonium nitrate, ammonia and nitric acid, will shut down its plant so that its electricity can be used by the households of the Mangistau region instead, the company said in a Monday press release.

At the moment, KazAzot is supplying 24 MW of electricity to the grid, after the production suspension the local grid will receive 29-30 MW from the company, according to the press release.

"The production processes are being shut down gradually. Yesterday, on August 13, we started shutting down the compound fertilizers shop. In the early morning of August 14 we shut down the compound fertilizers shop, the weak nitric acid shop and the ammonia shop," the press release says.

On August 11, MAEK experienced a double failure of equipment at Cogeneration Heat and Power Plant No.2 (CHPP-2) owned by MAEK that led to a massive power outage in the Mangistau and Atyrau regions, in the west of Kazakhstan. It's the second consecutive shutdown at MAEK over the past month. On the same day, Power Generation Unit No.3 at TPP, another power plant owned by MAEK, also failed and shut down resulting in a 147 MW drop in power generation, which led to a decrease of 55 MW in power supply in the Atyrau grid and 35 MW in the Mangistau grid.

On July 3, the power supply was disrupted in the Atyrau region due to an emergency shutdown of MAEK's Power Unit No. 1. As a result of the accident, a number of enterprises in the region had to shut down their production processes, including the Atyrau refinery. Repairs of Unit No.1 were completed on July 9. It took two attempts to restart the Unit.

MAEK LLP is owned by the local government of the Mangistau region. The company produces and supplies electricity, heat, potable and technical water and distillate to the Mangistau region, west Kazakhstan.