Chandrapur, Maharashtra: India is in the midst of a massive power crisis with shortage of coal being cited as one of the key reasons. From today onwards, NDTV will provide a series of ground reports from across the country giving a glimpse of how power projects have come to a standstill due to lack of coal and other feedstock. The first place we start is in Chandrapur in Maharashtra.
Chandrapur is a nondescript little town only kilometers away from Maharashtra's Naxal affected areas. But this town accounts for of the largest thermal power stations in the state, which in turn accounts for 20% of Maharashtra's electricity needs. Thus it is of vital importance to the state.
Bur like several other plants in the country the Chandrapur TPS has been battling a severe coal crunch. Chandrapur TPS gets 40,000 metric tonnes of coal, but with the coal shortages that's gone down to 30,000 tonnes which has resulted in its generation capacity dropping to almost half last week. This has led to severe loadshedding across the state.
This week things have improved a little but only after the Centre intervened.
The management here have blamed the poor quality of coal supplied by Western Coalfields Limited (WCL) for the load factor going down. They alleged that coal companies prefer to give good quality coal to private players as they fetch a better price in e-auctions
But WCL, which is a subsidiary of Coal India is fighting its own battles. While demand from power plants has increased, CIL's production has slipped and the calorific value of its coal has been deteriorating year after year. If a solution is not found quickly for this crisis, it will mean long spells of darkness all acroos the nation.
Chandrapur is a nondescript little town only kilometers away from Maharashtra's Naxal affected areas. But this town accounts for of the largest thermal power stations in the state, which in turn accounts for 20% of Maharashtra's electricity needs. Thus it is of vital importance to the state.
Bur like several other plants in the country the Chandrapur TPS has been battling a severe coal crunch. Chandrapur TPS gets 40,000 metric tonnes of coal, but with the coal shortages that's gone down to 30,000 tonnes which has resulted in its generation capacity dropping to almost half last week. This has led to severe loadshedding across the state.
This week things have improved a little but only after the Centre intervened.
The management here have blamed the poor quality of coal supplied by Western Coalfields Limited (WCL) for the load factor going down. They alleged that coal companies prefer to give good quality coal to private players as they fetch a better price in e-auctions
But WCL, which is a subsidiary of Coal India is fighting its own battles. While demand from power plants has increased, CIL's production has slipped and the calorific value of its coal has been deteriorating year after year. If a solution is not found quickly for this crisis, it will mean long spells of darkness all acroos the nation.
No comments:
Post a Comment