Maharatna public sector undertaking (PSU) NTPC is believed to have revived its plan to set up a 1600 Mw super thermal power station at Gajamara in Odisha’s Dhenkanal district.
Though NTPC had originally proposed to set up the power project on its own, lack of a coal block had forced the central utility to push the project to the backburner. But of late, NTPC is understood to have initiated talks with National Aluminium Company (NALCO) and Coal India subsidiary Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL) to set up the plant.
NTPC is likely to keep management control of the proposed project while offloading stakes to NALCO and MCL. The exact equity holding is yet to be firmed up as talks were still nascent.
A senior NTPC executive said, “Our board keeps evaluating different proposals from time to time. As for the Gajamara project, we have decided to move ahead once we have coal block in sight. A partnership with MCL can help us with coal supplies but nothing has been decided on it now.”
NTPC had proposed to invest INR 11000 crore on the Gajamara plant. Lack of coal block or firm coal linkage, however, impeded the progress of the project. Hence, no power purchase agreement could be tied up.
When contacted, a senior MCL official said, “The proposed collaboration with NTPC and NALCO is still fluid. MCL instead, is concentrating on its own pithead power plant in the Basundhara region where it has piled up surplus coal.”
NALCO’s chairman T K Chand was not immediately available for his comments.
The Gajamara super thermal power project needed 2900 acres of land. Gram sabha for the project is already completed. As part of the project, NTPC had committed to set up a power engineering institute.
Leave a Reply