Singareni to invite fresh bids for power project

To upgrade Kothagudem project to 20 Mw.

State-owned Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) will invite fresh tenders for upgrading its 6Mw power plant to 20 Mw at Kothagudem in Khammam district of Andhra Pradesh. The project is estimated to cost about Rs 100 crore.

Speaking to Business Standard, SCCL director (operations) JV Dattatreyulu said the company was revising the specifications of the project and would call for fresh tenders for the project in a month as the earlier attempt received a lukewarm response.

Meanwhile, the company has called for expressions of interest for forming a joint venture for an underground coal gasification project in Andhra Pradesh. It would take about three months for the notice inviting tenders (NITs) to be processed.

The joint venture, among other things, would assess the availability of underground coal that can be converted into gas and extracted. This would involve drilling at multiple locations and the results would be analysed to see if the project is technically feasible. “The piloting of the project has already begun. The challenge before us is to prove its potential for large scale operations,” he said.

SCCL in the financial year 2009-10 would increase its coal capacity by 2 million tonne from the extension of Srirampur mine in Adilabad, an equal capacity from the open cast mine at Bhupalapalli in Warangal and another 7,00,000 tonne to 1 million tonne from a new underground mine at Manuguru in Khammam.

WIth this, its total capacity would touch the target of 50.4 million tonne by the end of 2009-10. SCCL is on course to achieve 44 million tonne by the end of March, as against the set target of 42.5 million tonne.

Ruling out plans to mine coal abroad, Dattatreyulu said the focus would be on bringing technology experts — and also investors — to take up exploration of deep-seated coal mines at a competitive fee. “The idea is to add 1.5 million tonne to 2 million tonne capacity from about 10 non-viable open and underground blocks,” he said.

The company has also revisited its coal washing policies. One washery at Manuguru would be operationlised in May or June. It would initially have a 1 million tonne per annum (mtpa) capacity, which would be ramped up to 1.5 mtpa. SSCL is negotiating with three washeries on a build, own and operate concept. SCCL would get the reject rights too. “This would ensure that there is no siphoning off coal in the name of reject,” he said.