Established in 1993, the American-Uzbekistan Chamber of Commerce (AUCC) is a private, non-profit trade association representing interests of U.S. businesses ranging in size from small private enterprises to large, multinational corporations conducting business in Uzbekistan.

Our Mission: To advocate the views of the business community to ensure that private sector positions are considered during the development of key policies that impact American businesses and the future of U.S.-Uzbekistan relations.

Uzbek Foreign Minister Abdulaziz Kamilov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry have discussed issues of bilateral cooperation, the Uzbek foreign ministry said on Wednesday.

According to the report, the parties have stressed a regular dialogue and mutual visits at a political level, inter-parliamentary contacts and business meetings, cultural and humanitarian relations can steadily expand mutually beneficial cooperation.

Uzbekistan and the U.S are considering expanding trade and economic, investment cooperation and implementation of joint high-tech projects in various sectors of the economy as a priority.

The U.S. Secretary of State said at a briefing that Uzbekistan greatly assists the operation of the distribution network of supplies to Afghanistan, as well as participates in such major infrastructure projects as railway construction in Afghanistan and provision of electricity.

A press conference devoted to the basic problems of infrastructure development and production, as well as technical and technological modernization of open joint stock company Uzbekkumir was held at the National Press Center of Uzbekistan.

The coal industry occupies a key position in the fuel and energy complex of Uzbekistan. For many years, a steady growth of coal production volumes and realization of products, as well as positive changes in the main economic and financial indicators have been observed in the industry.

The resolution of the President Islam Karimov "On the priorities of industrial development of Uzbekistan in 2011-2015" dated from 15 December 2010 and annually approved investment programs contribute to it.

According to the Deputy Director of the open joint stock company Uzbekkumir N.Umarov, our country has large reserves of coal. Taking into account the importance of increasing the share of coal in the energy sector, the open joint stock company Uzbekkumir introducing new advanced technologies, manufacturing processes are being improved, as well as a number of investment projects aimed at modernization, technological upgrading and expansion of existing facilities are being implemented.

Among the major investment projects is the project for the introduction of cyclic-flow technologies in production, as well as translation of blocks number 1-5 of Novo-Angren thermal power station to year-round burning of coal with the help of modernization of the Angren section.

It will increase the volume of production, transportation and coaling from 3.2 to 6.4 million tons per year by 2016 year.

The first step towards this goal was the purchase of 15 excavators of various modifications, 30 motor vehicles of "BelAZ" with carrying capacity up to 110 tons and the main processing lines of conveyor transport with a total length over 14 thousand meters. In addition, loaders, graders, bulldozers, drilling rigs, crawler excavators and other ancillary equipment were acquired.

The second phase of modernization of the section of Angren and modernization of Shargunkumir, resulting in plans to provide coal mining in the amount of 900 thousand tons per year is also considered as one of the important investment projects of the open joint stock company Uzbekkumir.

Work on the technological upgrading of the plant and repair of mining and processing equipment will allow to expand its range of spare parts, components, parts, improve the repair of the mountain-transport and mining equipment, as well as to increase the capacity of the plant in average by 2.5 times.

The implementation of all planned projects will radically revise the structure of the balance sheet of power generation in our country and greatly increase the production of coal, as well as to expand the range of highly liquid products of coal mines.

Japan's Tohoku Electric Power Co finished implementation of a model project with the cost of 62.9 million for the construction of a gas turbine installation (GTI) with production capacity of 27 MW in Tashkent combined heat and power plants (CHP), a representative of the State Joint Stock Company (SJC) "Uzbekenergo" told Trend on Friday.

As reported earlier, the contract between "Uzbekenergo" SJSC and the Japanese company was signed in July 2009.

In order to accelerate the implementation of the project, in February 2010 the President of Uzbekistan issued a special decree allowing implementation of construction works on Tashkent CHP simultaneous with the development of construction documents before approvement of the feasibility study by the government.

The project is based on proposals of Japanese New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).

The construction works in Tashkent CHP started in March 2010.

A gas turbine with a generator with 27 MW capacity produced by Japan's Hitachi company and a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) with the capacity of 47 tons per hour. Steam with the temperature of 414 C and the density of 30 kg/cm2 is delivered to the general station superheated steam collector, power -- to a 110/220 kV transformer by a 110 kV power line.

According to the interviewee, in late March the company will test cogeneration gas turbine technology. Test mode will take about 15 days, after which Tashkent CHP, which is one of the key producers of heat and electricity in the country, will start working at full capacity.

The project will enable increase of power generation at Tashkent CHP by 228 million kW h -- up to 400 million kWh.

Thereby, gas consumption in the CHP will decline by 39 million cubic meters, and carbon dioxide emissions -- by 65 tons per year.

The project was funded by a 38 million grant from NEDO and own resources of "Uzbekenergo" in the amount of 24.9 million.

Tashkent CHP, one of major thermal power plants in Tashkent, was put into operation in 1961. Currently, its capacity constitutes 30 MW, annual output -- about 170 million kWh of electric power.

Uzbekistan is planning to implement 24 projects in the power production development sphere with total cost of 3.5 billion until 2015, including eight projects on heat-and-power engineering providing additional capacities in the amount of 2.255 thousand MW, and 15 projects in hydroenergetics providing additional 440 MW.

Uzbekistan increased its electric power production by 0.2 percent in 2012 compared to 2011 -- up to 52.534 billion kWh. The amount of heat energy supply reduced by 0.2 percent to 18.876 kcal.