The 3000 MW NTPC Kaniha, India’s second largest power plant, will shortly get supplies of imported coal for operating all its six 500MW units with full load.
NTPC Kaniha, located 30 km from the Talcher Coalfields and feeding power to 17 states across the country, had been running five out of its six 500MW units for some months as one of the units was under annual maintenance.
According to an NTPC official, the NTPC Kaniha plant will receive two lakh tonnes of imported coal from October 15 out of 8.2 million tonnes of foreign coal being imported by the utility major for its power stations located throughout the country.
“We will receive at least two rakes per day from October 15 amounting to 7,000 tonnes of coal daily for the coming six months”, said a highly placed NTPC official. Sources said that NTPC imports coal through State Trading Corporation (STC) and the foreign coal would be blended with Indian coal at 15:85 ratio for use in the power plant.
It may be noted that NTPC Kaniha had been grappling with acute coal shortage and the power plant had slipped into the super critical stage last month with coal stock of barely two days.
According to official sources, the plant cannot run all its six units with full load without importing coal. The plant is now getting about 50,000 tonnes of coal every day from Mahanadi Coalfields Limited (MCL) through the Merry Go Round system and Railways from Talcher and Ib valley fields.
NTPC sources informed that the plant gets about 30,000 tonnes of coal from Lingaraj mines of Talcher through Merry Go Round while the remaining coal is sourced from Ib valley fields and Talcher through railway rakes.
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With the import of coal, it is expected that there will be no problem of coal for the plant from October 15 when coal stock will be built up. The power plant has now a stock of about 70, 000 tonnes of indigenous coal.
NTPC authorities said that they may face coal problem from October 6-15 when they would resume power generation from the sixth unit after its annual overhaul. During this period, the requirement of coal for the power plant will be around 60,000 tonnes against the current coal supply of 50,000 tonnes per day.
At present five units are on steam as the sixth unit was shut down for annual maintenance. The plant requires about 60,000 tonnes of coal per day for running all its six units on full load.