Coal news and updates

Three of the four power plants in the district, which are run by Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) and SAIL, raised an alarm over depleting coal inventory.

 

Two units of DVC, Chandrapura Thermal Power Station (CTPS) and Bokaro Thermal Power Station (BTPS), and Bokaro Power Supply Company (BPSCL), a joint venture of DVC and SAIL, said on Saturday their dwindling coal stocks would last five to 10 days.

 

"Coal consumption per day at our unit is about 5,000 tonnes. But due to poor supply, our coal stock, which once used to remain at around 1.2 lakh tonnes, has fallen to around 16,000 tonnes. Earlier, we used to receive one-and-a-half rakes (train) of coal everyday from mines to meet our requirement. But now we hardly receive one rack in two or three days for the last couple of months," said Rakesh Bhargava, CEO, BPSCL.

 

CTPS and BTPS too are facing acute coal crisis. While the former has stock for 10 days, the latter has stock for less than five days. The 890MW CTPS requires 11,000 tonnes of coal everyday.

 

The crisis has forced the power units to reduce power generation and take measures to reduce consumption of coal to make their plant run longer. BPSCL, a 302 MW capacity power plant, supplies its entire power production to Bokaro Steel. It has reduced power generation to 140-50 MW from 200 MW and above. BTPS is running two of its three 210MW units.

 

"We used to keep 3 lakh tonnes of coal in our reserve, but due to less supply we had consumed more than 50% of our stock. Earlier, we used to get three racks (each rack carries about 3,300 tonnes of coal) in addition to the 5,000 tonnes from road transport per day. Now we are receiving only one rack and 2,000 tonnes by trucks," said a top official at CTPS.

 

Three of the four are facing coal crisis similar to other 45 power plants in the country, including NTPC. The situation in power plant here is deteriorating each day as poor coal supply since April has forced them to exhaust their coal stock.

 

Surprisingly, MD of state-run Tenughat Thermal Power Station, G L Tripathi saidd the unit has sufficient stock. He said

 

the power unit took precautions keeping in mind the crisis during the monsoon. Of its two units of 210 MW each, one is running.

 

"We have coal stock for 20 days to meet the requirement. Jharkhand can depend on us," said Tripathi.

 

Chief engineer of BTPS, J P Singh sounded the same. He said of the three units of 210 MW each, they are running only two units. They are having about 15000 tonne of coal in their stock against the daily consumption of 6000 per day. The coal supply has been affected since March 31 to the power plant.

 

"I have informed my headquarters related to the critical condition of coal while are also asking coal companies to restore the adequate supply soon," said Singh.

 

 

Source: ToI