(AFP) - Electricity supplier Tenaga Nasional Bhd today awarded a RM2.1 billion contract to a Japanese-led consortium to upgrade an existing power plant.

TNB signed an engineering, procurement and construction contract with the consortium comprising Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Mitsui Co and local firm Putra Capital Power.

The consortium will replace two conventional sections at the Tuanku Jaafar power station in Negeri Sembilan with a new gas-fired combined cycle plant with capacity of 750 megawatts.

The move would raise the current plant's capacity from 600 megawatts to 1,100, with the new section scheduled for operation by October 2004.

The national power firm said in a statement that it planned to build another 750 megawatt combined cycle plant at a later stage on the site.

'Post-New York attacks'

Tenaga chairman Jamaludin Mohamad Jarjis said the second phase of upgrading would depend on electricity demand and economic growth.

"We need to look at our growth, post-New York (attacks). We are looking at the US economy and will also be guided by our own budget," he told a press conference after the signing ceremony.

Jamaludin said up to 75 percent of the current upgrading work would be funded by a loan from Japan Bank for International Cooperation, with the rest from internal funds.

He said the company expected to post better results for its financial year ending August 2001, due to be released later this month. "We should have comfortable results. It should be better than last year's."

In the year to August 2000, TNB posted a net profit of RM1.332 billion on the back of sales of RM13.719 billion.