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The power ministry might take pride in record capacity additions over the past few years. But a report of its own technical arm, the Central Electricity Authority (CEA), reveals that part of this capacity, based on Chinese equipment, has come up in violation of operational and safety norms.
The 41-page report by a committee under CEA Chairman A S Bakshi was recently given to the power ministry. It lambasts Chinese power gear on all key operational parameters - operating load factor, heat rate, auxiliary consumption, frequency of forced outages, breakdowns, etc - and safety mechanisms, putting in the dock around 12 per cent, or 25,000 Mw, of India's installed capacity.
Many private power generators, such as Reliance Power, Sterlite, Lanco and Adani, besides some state-government ones, have bought equipment from Chinese firms. "Chinese turbines do not have safety functions like turbine stress evaluator and auto turbine run-up systems. The level of automation or control systems of Chinese turbines is not in line with present-day turbine designs and technology... leading to the possibility of compromised safety and mal-operation," the report said. Total outages for Chinese units based on domestic coal are substantially higher than the ones from Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL). Chinese units based on imported coal have, however, done better than BHEL on some parameters.
As of April-end, 24,437 Mw of India's installed capacity was based on imported Chinese equipment. These have been supplied by five Chinese companies - Dongfang Electric Corp, Shanghai Electric Corp, Babcock Wilcox, Beijing Beizhong and Harbin. The bulk of this capacity includes 300-Mw and 600-Mw sub-critical units, while there also are six super-critical units of 660 Mw each. Besides, 42,000-Mw of Chinese-equipment-based capacity is under construction.
The CEA study compared 22 Chinese sub-critical units of 300-Mw and 600-Mw unit sizes (totalling 8,220 Mw) with 36 BHEL-made sub-critical units of 250-Mw and 500-Mw sizes (totalling 12,480 Mw).
CEA compared the performance of these units over a four-year period (from April 2007 to March 2011). The study, also involving field visits to power plants with Chinese and BHEL equipment, found BHEL's 250-Mw machines had a better heat rate of 1,893 Kcal a unit, against Chinese 300-Mw machines' 1,910 Kcal per unit (higher heat rate signifies a machine's lower efficiency in converting fuel into electricity). According to the study, load factor for Chinese units that were based on domestic coal worked out to 57 per cent, compared with BHEL units' 72 per cent.
Dongfang's India representative, Li Qi, had told Business Standard in an interview last week: "I think there is no basis for thinking Chinese equipment perform badly. Our feedback from most customers has been positive." The CEA report was commissioned in March as an update to an earlier 2008 report of the power ministry on quality of Chinese equipment. It has come against the backdrop of domestic manufacturers' demand for a further increase in import duty on equipment and making local manufacturing a pre-condition for overseas suppliers. State-owned BHEL accounts for less than 20,000 Mw of the current local capacity of 27,000 Mw.
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