SET-listed Electricity Generating Plc (Egco) is playing down a water leakage at its Nam Theun 1 hydropower plant in Laos, saying it is "normal" when a dam starts to reserve water.
The company responded after reports of the incident emerged on social media over the weekend, which generated concern among local residents.
Egco president Thepparat Theppitak said his company and the Lao government are working to provide accurate information on the dam to alleviate concern among the public.
Water was found to be leaking from the side walls' rocky crevices of this roller-compacted concrete dam, he said, insisting that this would not affect the dam's structure.
Construction of the dam began in 2017. The reservoir started receiving water in June 2021.
The hydropower plant project is currently in the final stages of development, with all the construction work being carried out in line with international standards.
Nam Theun 1 is scheduled to start operations in August this year.
"The dam is regularly inspected to ensure its safety as we prepared for a test run before a commercial operation in August," Egco said in a statement submitted to the Stock Exchange of Thailand.
This US$1.3-billion project is a joint venture involving three partners -- Phonesack Group with a 60% stake, Egco with a 25% stake, and Electricite Du Laos (EDL) with a 15% stake.
Nam Theun 1 is designed to produce 650 megawatts of electricity a year.
State-run Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (Egat) signed a long-term power purchase agreement in September 2017 to buy 514.3MW of electricity from the project. Egat is Egco's parent company.
EDL has since signed another agreement to purchase 130MW of electricity from the facility.
Mr Thepparat earlier said that Egco would open two new clean power plants this year.
The two facilities are the 640-MW Yunlin offshore wind farm in Taiwan and the Nam Theun 1 hydropower plant.
