Clean Air for Almaty: Coal Power to Be Moved to Pavlodar Region

The coal-fired capacity intended for Almaty is being considered for redirection to the Pavlodar region. This was announced at a Central Communications Service press conference by Vice Minister of Energy Sungat Yesimkhanov, Orda.kz reports

When asked by an Orda.kz journalist whether the infrastructure in the Pavlodar Region might lag behind the pace of construction of coal power plants, Mr Yesimkhanov responded that the region’s infrastructure is currently being upgraded. At the start of the conference, the ministry acknowledged that the railway infrastructure is not yet ready and that the workforce is still being assembled. Furthermore, substantial resources and specialists will be required for the construction of a nuclear power plant in Balkhash.

Yesimkhanov confirmed that there would be no lack of synchronization. He addressed transportation in particular:

«We and our colleagues have been aligning our plans from the very beginning. These mechanisms will continue to develop. As for transportation, we are switching Almaty’s plants to gas and freeing up a large portion of transport capacity serving Almaty, which we will use.»

The vice minister also spoke separately about staffing in the sector.

«Regarding workforce issues, we have organised the work well: we have increased salaries and grants for heat power engineering at the Almaty University of Power Engineering and Telecommunications. In 2025, 200 people enrolled in heat power engineering alone; previously, we could not even attract five people. There is a separate training program for nuclear plants: about 20% of participants are narrow specialists, and the rest are conventional energy engineers.»

Thus, coal generation in the Pavlodar region will be developed using transport and human resources freed up in Almaty.

As we have repeatedly stated, Pavlodar Region is one of the regions with the highest levels of atmospheric pollutant emissions. According to official statistics, the region consistently ranks near the top in terms of industrial emissions, even without additional coal capacity.

Original author: Alexander Zhdanov