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R. Balaji

Chennai, Nov. 21 Biomass-based power producers in Tamil Nadu hope to bring in Power Trading Corporation of India to mediate in the third-party sale of power to industrial consumers.

According to Mr K. Raghu, Chairman and Managing Director, Ind Bharath Group, which operates over 40 MW of biomass-based power plants in the State, over 105 MW of biomass-based power capacity would be revived with the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) permitting third-party sale of power — power producers allowed to sell to consumers directly using the transmission infrastructure available with the TNEB.

They hope to get the Power Trading Corporation to intermediate in the sale of power to the consumers.

This would be beneficial in the long term for the biomass units instead of individual tie-up with consumers, he said.

The TNEB is likely to come out with an order allowing the biomass-based power units to start with the third-party sale of power within a day or two, Mr Raghu said.

Earlier, the units sold power to the TNEB at Rs 3.15 a unit.

But in the last three months, following the increase in cost of the raw material — biomass — most of the units found that this tariff was unviable and had either closed down or operated at a low capacity.

Fuel wood cost had increased to about Rs 2,200 a tonne against Rs 600-700 a tonne when the tariff was fixed by the TNEB.

But now, in the context of the power shortage in Tamil Nadu, industrial users faced the prospect of using diesel or furnace oil-based generators which resulted in a power cost of about Rs 11 a unit.

But the cost of power generation in biomass-based plants was about Rs 5.70 a unit — including raw material cost of about Rs 4.20 and a fixed cost of Rs 1.60. Biomass power would be cheaper than diesel-run generators, he said.

More Stories on : Non-conventional Energy | Tamil Nadu

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