West Bengal-Coal shortage fuels Bengal power crisis

Our Bureau /bussiness Line

Kolkata. Oct. 11

State and private thermal power stations from West Bengal form the bulk of the 11 power plants that have received coal supplies much below the guaranteed level from Coal India Ltd (CIL) during the first half of this fiscal.

According to the Indian coal major, a total of five power stations in the State belonging to the State- controlled West Bengal Power Development Corporation Ltd, Durgapur Projects Ltd and the 250 MW Titagarh thermal power situation of CESC Ltd were supplied less than 90 per cent of the contracted volume of coal due to logistical inadequacies or administrative inaction on the part of the TPS concerned.

CIL claim

“While some of these power stations are yet to put in place the requisite procedures to lift allocated quantities of coal from a mines in Orissa and Jharkhand. Plants such as 440 MW Bandel TPS of WBPDCL do not get adequate wagons because of consistent unloading problems,” the CIL Chairman, Mr Partha S. Bhattacharyya, said.

WBPDCL and DPL often cite non-availability of coal from CIL as the prime reason behind the drop in generation leading to frequent power crisis in the State.

Counter claim

Emphasising that he was not interested in a blame game, the WBPDCL Managing Director, Mr Debasis Sen, said that non-availability of suitable wagons and other technical problems pertaining to Indian Railways coupled with lack of supplies by CIL subsidiary Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd led to the crisis.

“We are in the process of resolving such issues with the concerned coal companies and are also importing coal to meet the requirement,” Mr Sen said. He, however, could not offer a timeframe for stepping up generation and ending the power crisis in the State.

While CESC officials were not available to comment, sources in the company said that while issues were yet to be resolved with CIL in regard to sourcing its entire requirement for Titagarh, the company had made alternative arrangements leading to consistent generation at approximately 90 per cent of the capacity of Titagarh TPS.

Massive shortfall

Meanwhile, the power situation in West Bengal has turned extremely “uncertain” in the last few years with frequent incidents of massive shortfall in supplies.

“The power situation in the State has become vulnerable and coal availability is just one of the reasons behind the frequent power crisis,” an official in the State Power Ministry told Business Line, adding that the State generation utilities need to resolve a number of managerial issues to be back on track.