NTPC to start ops at 1,600 Mw coal-based power plant in Odisha by 2019

NTPC Ltd plans to start commercial operations of its Rs 125 billion proposed 1600 Mw (2x800) supercritical coal-based power plant at Darlipalli in Odisha's Sundergarh by September 2019.

"One unit of 800 Mw will come by December in the next fiscal but the commercial operations is slated to kick-off by March 2019. By September 2019, the second unit of similar capacity is projected to start ", Ram Chandra Patnaik, general manager, Darlipali Super Thermal Power project of NTPC Ltd told media persons.

Odisha will get 50 per cent power of the total capacity.

The power major will source coal from its Dulanga coal mine to meet the raw material requirements. For additional requirements, it will source from Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL), a 100 per cent subsidiary of the Coal India Limited.

The project will consume eight million tonnes of coal annually. The beneficiary states of the project are Odisha (800 Mw), West Bengal (423 Mw), Jharkhand (142 Mw), Sikkim (21 Mw) and Bihar (215 Mw).

"The power purchase agreement with all the states are already in place", said Patnaik.

NTPC plans to phase out its 460 Mw plant of Talcher Thermal Power Station which has already completed 50 years in next five years, said R K Shrivastava, regional executive director of Eastern Region-II.

TTPS was taken over by NTPC Ltd from Odisha State Electricity Board in 1995. The country's largest power producer also has plans to have a 1320 Mw (2x660Mw) supercritical at TTPS after the phasing out 460 Mw.

"The expansion will come up in the same area. The townships will be reconstructed and modified and the horizontal ones will convert to vertical ones", he added.

The work for the 1320 Mw is expected to start in 2018-19 after getting the statutory clearances from the state and centre, said MK Singh, general manager, TTPS. The estimated investment is Rs five crore per Mw.