Coal news and updates

New railway line projects moving at fast pace: CIL

November 14: Active government interest appears to be auguring well for new mega railway projects in Odisha and Chhattisgarh (for evacuation of coal) even as progress on the stretch in Jharkhand is slightly tardy.

“There is indeed some lag in the Tori-Shivpuri projects in Jharkhand, but Bhupdevpur-Korichapar-Dharamjaigarh in Chhattisgarh and the Jharsuguda-Barpalli-Sardega project in Odisha are progressing very fast,” a senior official from Coal India Ltd (CIL) said.

“You can imagine the progress of work in Chhattisgarh from the fact that only last week (week ending November 7, 2014), there was Bhoomi poojan for all the bridges that are to be constructed on the route,” CIL’s Director (Technical) N Kumar said.

The Chhattisgarh project is progressing fast because the state government is one of the partners in it with a 10% stake, he said.

“On the whole, the project is moving extremely fast there. In fact, the state government itself is monitoring the progress,” Kumar added.

Even Jarsuguda-Barpalli is progressing well, he said, but did not give any details.

“So far as Tori-Shivpuri is concerned, we hope that at least one stretch will be operational by 2016-17. This project has got two parts – Tori-Shivpuri and Shivpuri-Kathautia. We hope that something positive will happen so far as the first stretch is concerned, but it appears that there will be considerable delay in the Shivpuri-Kathautia section,” Kumar said.

Asked how much of coal could be evacuated if only Tori-Shivpuri comes on stream, Kumar said, “Right now, two coal projects are already in operation, ie, Magadh and Amrapali (in CCL’s command area). One is 20 mtpa and other is 12 mtpa. So, from these two projects itself, there would be evacuation of around 32 million tons though there are 5-6 more projects lined up in this area.”