Power plants face coal crisis
Sarbjit Dhaliwal
Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, May 21
The dwindling stock of coal at various thermal plants in the state has become a cause of worry for the authorities concerned in the PSEB.

Their coal stock situation had already turned critical at the Lehra Mohabbat Thermal Plant. Though the stock position is better at the Guru Nanak Dev Thermal Plant at Bathinda and Ropar Thermal Plant as compared to the Lehra plant, yet it is not very comfortable, sources said.

The situation is even more critical in Haryana thermal plants, the sources said. Ropar requires 6 rakes per day to run all 6 units.

For building up stocks 7 to 8 rakes per day are required. In April 2009, Ropar received 148 rakes, which was less than 5 per day.

From May 1-21, Ropar received 102 rakes, again less than 5 per day. At present, all six units are running, so the coal stock is reducing daily by about 3,700 tonnes. In other words, the stock position is going from bad to worse.

The Lehra thermal plant requires 4.5 rakes per day to run all 4 units at full capacity. In April, Lehra received just 94 rakes, which was 3.1 rakes per day. During May 1-20, Lehra received 48 rakes, which was 2.4 rakes per day.

At present, units 1, 3, 4 at Lehra are running while unit 2 is on 15 days planned maintenance, starting from May 15.

So from June 1, all four units at Lehra are expected to run and consume 4.5
rakes per day.

The Lehra plant is facing a serious problem of coal unloading as one of the two wagon tipplers of stage 2 is under breakdown of prolonged nature.

Stage 1 coal handling plant is also in poor condition and due to the detention of wagons the Lehra plant had to pay demurrage of Rs 60 Lakh in April and in May the demurrage will be around Rs 1 crore, it is learnt.