Nurzhan council approves IS 10.4 million for two local boiler houses
The gas-fired plants are meant to take about 6,900 homes on the city's outer estates off the central network before the heating season begins.
NURZHAN — Nurzhan city council on Tuesday approved IS 10.4 million (US$2.1 million) for the first stage of a plan to move outlying estates off the city's central heating network and on to two local gas-fired boiler houses.
According to the council papers, the two plants, with a combined capacity of 48 megawatts, are about 90 percent built and are due to be fired before the heating season opens on 15 October. They will serve about 6,900 heating accounts in the 11th mikrorayon and in the railway settlement behind the Nurzhan Rail Freight Depot, both at the far end of mains that run several kilometres from the central plant. The motion passed by 27 votes to 4, with two abstentions.
Vyacheslav Kornienko, director of the city heating enterprise, told councillors that the two areas lose more heat in the pipes than any other part of the network. "We are heating the ground under the steppe to keep a few thousand flats warm," he said. "A boiler house next to the blocks loses far less on the way and costs less to keep up." He said the central heat and power plant would keep supplying the rest of the city.
“We are approving the kettle without knowing the price of the gas”Dmitry Lazarenko, Nurzhan city councillor
The council's estimates show the city spent IS 1.7 million last winter repairing the two branch mains, which date from the 1970s. They are among the sections left out of the replacement programme Nurzhan began in 2013, after the failures of the 2012 winter, which the Talas Herald reported at the time.
Residents of the 11th mikrorayon say they have heard promises before. Galina Zakharchenko, 68, a retired crane operator who has lived on the estate since 1979, said her radiators had been lukewarm for most of last January. "They dug up the yard twice and nothing changed," she said. "If the new boiler house works, I will be the first to say so. If it does not, I will be at the council again."
Dmitry Lazarenko, an independent councillor elected on a civic list, voted against. He said the papers gave the cost of building the plants but not the price at which NurGaz would sell them gas, or what it would mean for tariffs. "We are approving the kettle without knowing the price of the gas," he said. "The people on these estates are pensioners and rail workers, and they will pay the bill."
Replying in the debate, a deputy mayor said the gas would be bought under the city's existing supply contract with NurGaz and that tariffs for the two estates would not change this winter. The contract's terms have not been published. NurGaz did not respond to questions on Wednesday.
The heating enterprise has told the council it will report on the first month of operation in mid-November. A second stage, for three more estates on the eastern edge of the city, is to be costed in next year's budget.
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