The power plant is owned by Redbank Energy Pty Ltd and in a statement released yesterday to the Australian Stock Exchange the company said an assessment was currently being made as to whether repair or replacement of the relevant parts was necessary in order to restore the unit to service.

The statement said this process was ongoing and incomplete and until such time it was determined whether the appropriate course of action is repair or replacement, it was not possible to determine the duration of the outage and the costs associated with returning the unit to service.

The company said the investigations were expected to continue over the next two weeks.

Delaying the work is the fact the generation unit needs to cool down before a full investigation can take place.

Power produced from the 151 megawatt coal fired base load power station is sold to Ausgrid whose spokesman said there was currently enough capacity in the electricity grid to handle the shutdown of Redbank.

First commissioned in 1999 the power station has been on the market since late last year and it is the sole asset of Redbank Energy Pty Ltd.

This current problem follows a history of mishaps with the power station which was originally heralded as offering break through technology with its use of waste coal or dewatered tailings from the nearby Warkworth coalmine.

But it has since been claimed the power station is a heavy green house gas polluter and in fact may produce more green house gas emissions than older conventional coal fired power stations.

Redbank Energy has entered a bank support agreement with its lenders which lasts until March 31 this year.

This agreement is based on the sale of the power station before that time or the availability of new refinancing agreements for the company.

However, with the outage the sale of the power station before that time looks unlikely.

A spokesman for Redbank Energy refused to comment on the affect if any of staffing arrangements during the current shutdown.