Year-on-year (YoY) net profits at Acwa Power Barka's seawater desalination plant in Oman fell by a quarter in the first six months of 2019, a bourse missive on Muscat Securities Market by the Saudi Arabian Acwa Power-backed entity revealed.
The independent water and power project (IWPP) Acwa Power Barka plant, which marks the Saudi firm’s entry into the Omani market, posted $10.1m (OMR39.m) in net profits after tax in H1 2019, a 25% dip on H1 2018’s corresponding $13.5m (OMR5.2m) figure.
Total revenue fell 29% during the same period, with the group bringing in $62.3m (OMR24m) in cash between January and June 2019.
Acwa Power’s Oman debut with Barka 1 IWPP is viewed as first step of its strategy to internationalise its business, building on its established presence in Saudi Arabia, but the plant has faced technical issues in the past year.
One of the its gas turbines tripped on 29 October, 2018, with the group citing an “earth fault in [the] electricity generator unit” as the root cause of the failure, according to a bourse missive at the time.
Another fault affected the plant's second gas turbine, known as GT-1, on 12 November – an issue also caused by an “earth fault” in the electricity generator unit.
Both gas turbines were shut down, and Acwa Power Barka said at the time that the financial impact of the technical failures could be in the range of $5.2m (OMR2m).
