Wintara-Salihi Group Inc. in Fort Washington, MD received an $8.7 million firm-fixed-price contract for the combustion inspection, re-commissioning and start-up of 2 Siemens gas turbine units (V64 and V94) including the associated auxiliary systems and equipment at the Kirkuk/Taza power plant in Kirkuk, Iraq. Work is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2007. Bids were solicited via the World Wide Web on Jan. 3, 2007, and 4 bids were received by the U.S. Army Joint Contracting Command-Iraq/Afghanistan in Baghdad, Iraq (W91GXY-07-C-0012).
Iraq’s power system was discovered to be in terrible shape post-invasion, and built mostly for the benefit of the area around Baghdad. Improving power distribution has been a long process marked by slow progress, with a growing focus on improving regional power capabilities as a key lever for building local support and stability. Kirkuk is a northern city that has always been something of a mix, with a large Kurdish majority population and significant Turkomen and Arab minorities. A large number of additional Arabs were later settled there by Saddam in order to displace the Kurds, a fact which complicates the current political situation. Kirkuk’s status going forward remains a live political issue within Iraq, and beyond.