National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), the country's biggest thermal power producer, expects to get physical possession of land for its super thermal projects proposed at Gajamara and Darlipalli, with capacity of 1,600 MW apiece, by June this year.
While the Darlipalli power station in Sundergarh district needs 1,652 acres, the Gajamara project in Dhenkanal district is going to be set up on 1,013 acres.
“For the Darlipalli project, notification under Section 6 (of the Land Acquisition Act) has been issued. Similarly, Section 6 is being approved for the Gajamara project. Once we get possession of land, we will begin ground levelling work. NTPC is going to invest Rs 24,000 crore on these two projects that are to be taken up in the 12th Plan period,” said Jayadeb Nanda, regional executive director (east-II).
The Darlipalli super thermal power project will draw water from the Hirakud reservoir in the Mahanadi river. NTPC has secured coal linkage for this project in the form of Dulunga coal block with mine capacity of seven million tonnes per annum (mtpa) under command area of Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL) and Pakri Barwadih block in Bihar's Hazaribagh district with 12.5 mtpa. The project cost is estimated at Rs 12850.07 crore.
Besides implementing the project, NTPC has contributed Rs 3 crore towards upgradation of the district headquarter hospital in Sundergarh. In toto, the power major will be investing Rs 10 crore in renovation of this government run hospital.
In addition, NTPC has also lined up an investment of Rs 300- Rs 350 crore in building a medical college cum hospital at a site close to Sundergarh. The state government has identified a patch of 55 acres of land, three km from Sundergarh for the hospital project.
The Gajamara project will draw water from the upstream of Mundali barrage on Mahanadi river.
NTPC is also going ahead with capacity expansion of its Talcher Thermal Power Station (TTPS). The company is adding two super critical units of 660 MW each to this power plant whose current capacity stands at 460 MW. No land is needed to meet the capacity expansion programme and this would be readied by the first year of the 13th Plan (2017-22).
“For TTPS expansion, coal linkage is a problem, After we get the coal linkage, we would apply for the environment clearance and can go ahead with the expansion plan,” Nanda said.
On coal supplies from MCL, he said, “The supply of coal is improving and now there are no issues with it. For the TTPS plant, we have more than 170,000 tonnes of coal stock whereas for the Kaniha plant, we have around 80,000 tonnes of coal. At present, the quality of coal supplied by MCL is vey good,” he added.
The NTPC official said the power producer is offering a total of 1,355 MW to the state grid which includes 518 MW from the Kaniha plant, the entire 460 MW from the TTPS, 218 MW state share from the Farakka station and 159 MW from the Kahalgaon station.
NTPC is also investing Rs 300-Rs 350 crore on laying a pipeline to dump from the 3,000 MW Kaniha plant to the mine voids of Jagannath coal mines.
