The Warangoi Hydropower station is located a short half an hour drive from Kokopo Airport. It was originally constructed by a Norwegian company more than 35years ago, with a capacity of 10MW power supply, however since the early 2000’s it has not reached its full potential.
The Warangoi Hydropower station is a combination if two rivers, the larger Warangoi river and the smaller Rapmirini river. The catchment combines the water and sends it through a 7km underground tunnel, through to the station. From the tunnel to the station there is an incline of about 250m, this allows for natural downward pull. The water is then directly transferred to the station which contains four turbines, with the combined power generation capacity of approximately 10megawatts. The station was in dire need of a refurbishment, due to leaks in the penstock tunnel, water redirection in the catchment and overall equipment change in the powerhouse.
"..Power generation from here (Warangoi HPP) has produced so many economic benefits for East New Britain" - Hon. James Marape, PM (2021)
AG has successfully completed the maintenance of the whole setup. New equipment has been fitted into the Power Station, including turbines, new cranes, and we created a brand new extension, to cater for a new control room. This control room is on the second floor of the warehouse, allowing a 180 view of the setup. There are also two new transmission lines that were constructed, these two have split the power supply to send through to the Kokopo and Rabaul grid. We have also constructed an extension to the catchment, to allow greater water capacity at the dam. Our workers have also repaired the underground tunnel, making sure that everything is covered and we do not have any leakages.
This project provided employment to over a hundred workers (Employee testimonial: https://www.aginvestmentpng.com/post/employee-highlights-chatting-with-jackson-banas ) ;about 25 international workers and over 80 nationals. The Prime Minister mentioned the the "power generation from here (Warangoi HPP) has produced so many economic benefits for East New Britain" in his speech during the commissioning of the Hydropower project in December 2021. The Warangoi hydropower station now supplies a steady power source for the Kokopo and Rabaul grid, and is now operating at full capacity.
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