While the Odisha Power Generation Corporation (OPGC) needs additional bridge linkage of 20.56 million tonnes of coal to synchronise one of the two 660-MW projects by end of 2017-18, the Union Government is yet to consider the State Government’s requests in this regard.
The OPGC needs 38.31MT of coal for its two new thermal power plants of 620 MW-capacity each. Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and Energy Minister Pranab Prakash Das have already urged Union Coal, Power and Mines Minister Piyush Goyal to provide coal linkage from the lakhanpur block of the MCl.
So far, bridge linkage of 3.94 MT has been allocated so far. As per schedule, the coal production from linked allocated mines will start from April 2019 onwards and will be ramped up to full capacity by the year 2022-23.
However, the OPGC IB Thermal Power Station has set a target to synchronize the first unit of 660-MW in the 3rd Quarter and second unit in 4th quarter of 2017-18. So there is an urgent need of bridge linkage of additional requirement of 20.56 MT coal. And this requirement would be for at least six years from 2017-18. Accordingly, the State Government has urged to provide additional bridge linkage of 20.56 MT coal to OPGC from the lakhanpur mines.
While bridge link issue is yet to be sorted out, setting up of the Merry Go Round (MGR) Rail link to transport the coal to the OPGC Plant in the IB Valley is stuck with land issues.
While 44.48 acres of land is required for the purpose, not a single acre has been acquired. The process of land acquisition remains to be very slow against the MCl CMD’s commitment to handover the land by October, 2016. Several issues like finalization and approval of compensation for land are yet to be finalized by MCl. The State Government has urged the Ministry of Coal to intervene in the matter for early solution so that the MGR rail link would be operational in a time bound manner.