Power Ministry Seeks Goyal's Help for Coal Supply to 9940 MW Plants

With Coal Ministry rejecting the Power Ministry's request to provide fuel to 9940 MW plants of companies like Essar Power, GMR and GVK Power, the latter has sought intervention of Coal and Power Minister Piyush Goyal into the matter.

A list of "similarly placed projects" of 4095 MW was sent to the coal ministry for supply of coal. Further 5845 MW has coal blocks, but mining is delayed by one-two years. Hence tapering linkages needs to be given for one-two years, but Ministry of Coal has rejected it on the ground that they have coal blocks," according to an official document.

The Cabinet had in June, last year decided that coal may be supplied to similarly placed projects without affecting 78,000 MW of power projects.

The criteria for similarly placed, among other things, state that the plants should be commissioned before March, 2015 and Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) should be signed, it said.

The four units for 4095 MW include, GMR's Raikheda TPP (Thermal Power Plant) in Chhattisgarh and Monnet's Malibrahmani TPP in Odisha, it said.

The six units of 5845 MW under the category of "similarly placed power plants" expected to be commissioned by March, next year that require tapering linkage include Essar Power's Mahan TPP and GVK Power's Govindawal Sahib, among others, it added.

Tapering Linkage is the short-term linkage provided to those coal consumers who have been allocated captive coal blocks for meeting the fossil fuel requirements of their end use plants but where coal production has not begun.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) had in June last year asked Coal India to sign fuel supply agreements (FSA) for a total capacity of 78,000 MW, including cases of tapering linkage, which are likely to be commissioned by March 31, 2015.