NTPC's Korba plant back on track

A Chhattisgarh High Court order has come as a big breather for the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) to set up ash-dyke for its Korba station that had severely hit production.

The 2650-Mw power station of NTPC in Korba—about 250 km from here—was plunged into serious crises when its ash-dyke in Dhanras was severely damaged following excess rainfall in September last year. Since the plant could not dump ash, the production in the station was also badly affected.

The company was constructing a new ash-dyke in Ghorapat village. But the project hit a blockade as the family of Kumar Ban Goswami refused to give away the land. The land was located in the heart of the project and that stalled the construction work. In fact, the NTPC had acquired the land around Goswami’s land but it did not solve the purpose.The Chhattisgarh High Court had ordered the eviction of Goswami’s family from the land and asked the NTPC to pay the required compensation as mentioned in the policy of the state government. The court order had paved way for NTPC to acquire the entire land for its project and complete the construction work of the ash-dyke.

The Korba unit is one of the stations of the NTPC that produces power at the cheapest rate. The Korba project has completed more than 25 years of operation since the commercial operation declaration of its first unit way back in 1983.

The severe damage caused to the Dhanras ash-dyke had forced the NTPC to close a few units. The company was in need of a new ash-dyke and the order from the court of law had paved way to complete the work at Ghorapat. The new ash-dyke would come up in 430 acres of area. Goswami’s family owned about 30 acres of land.

The NTPC officials said that the reluctance of a family to give away their land had delayed the ask-dyke project by nearly two years. “Had the project completed in time, the company would not have faced such a tough time in the last financial year,” they added.

Despite facing challenges, the station produced 18030.297 million units (MUs) of power in the financial year 2011-12 even as most of its units remained shut down for a significant portion of the year. The station achieved 78.95 per cent Plant Load Factor (PLF) with an availability of 83.71 per cent during the period.