New Delhi: Government of India has taken several initiatives to improve the efficiency of coal based power plants and to reduce its carbon footprint. All new, large coal-based generating stations have been mandated to use the highly efficient supercritical technology.
Renovation and Modernization (R&M) and Life Extension (LE) of existing old power stations is being undertaken in a phased manner. About 144 old thermal stations have been assigned mandatory targets for improving energy efficiency. Coal beneficiation has been made mandatory. Introduction of ultra-supercritical technology, as and when commercially available is part of future policy. Besides, stringent emission standards being contemplated for thermal plants would significantly reduce emissions.
To promote cleaner and alternate use of coal, CIL is pursuing initiatives for setting up plants for gasification of coal and its further processing into downstream chemicals. In this direction, CIL has formed a JV company along with RCF, GAIL and FCIL namely; Talcher Fertilizers Limited (TFL) to set up a coal based Ammonia-Urea plant at Talcher, Odisha, through Surface Coal Gasification route.
The current status of coal production of ‘ongoing projects’ of CIL is as follow:
| Subsidiary | Total ongoing Projects | Total Sanctioned Capacity
(MTY) |
Coal Production till Feb’2018
(MT) |
| ECL | 12 | 22.92 | 13.85 |
| BCCL | 5 | 12.95 | 2.53 |
| CCL | 15 | 57.72 | 17.30 |
| NCL | 4 | 65.00 | 50.80 |
| WCL | 26 | 45.16 | 15.42 |
| SECL | 34 | 203.24 | 75.13 |
| MCL | 16 | 167.83 | 71.22 |
| NEC | 4 | 1.20 | 0.00 |
| Total CIL | 116 | 576.02 | 246.25 |
Sector wise coal supply from CIL during 2017-18 (upto Feb’18) is as under:
(in Million tonnes)
| Sectors | Actual Dispatch 2017-18 (up to Feb’18) (Provisional) |
| Power | 411.30 |
| Fertilizer | 1.76 |
| Steel | 2.67 |
| CPP | 33.43 |
| Cement | 3.25 |
| Sponge Iron | 5.56 |
| Others | 67.11 |
| Total | 525.09 |
The current status of coal production of ‘ongoing projects’ of NLCIL is as follows:
NLCIL, at present operates 3 lignite mines (28.5 MTPA) linked to 4 pit head power stations at Neyveli (2990), one lignite mine (2.1 MTPA ) linked to pit head power station at Barsingsar, Rajasthan (250 MW). NLCIL uses the Lignite produced in its mines to the linked pit head power plants. Also a small quantity of lignite is being sold to an Independent power producer and small scale industries.
New mining projects of NLCIL are:
- Expansion of Mine-I 10.50 MTPA (Area Expansion) & Expansion of Mine- IA
(From 3.0 MTPA To 7.0 MTPA) - Hadla Lignite Mine (1.9 MTPA) and Bithnok Lignite Mine (2.25 MTPA) at Rajasthan.
- Mine-III project at Neyveli (11.5 MT per Annum)
- South of Vellar at Tamilnadu (11.5 MT per Annum) –(as a replacement for Mine-I&II)
- Pachwara South in Jharkhand (11 MTPA) –allocated on 25.07.2013.
- Talabira-II & III in Orissa (20 MTPA) – allocated on 02.05.2016.
This information was given by the Minister of Railways and Coal Shri Piyush Goyal in a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.
