Comments
There is good news for the citizens of Tamil Nadu. Close on the heels of the 600 MW at Mettur (finally) beginning to generate electricity, another under-construction power plant is about to do so.
‘Unit II’ of the North Chennai Thermal Power Station, also of 600 MW, will start pumping power into the grid “this month”, according to a senior official of the public sector power equipment major, Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL). BHEL is the equipment supplier and project contractor for the North Chennai project,
‘Unit I’ may have to wait a bit more. BHEL’s generator meant for the project fell into a river while being transported last year. Though BHEL has another generator ready for the North Chennai Unit I, its logistics contractor has not been able to move the equipment from the manufacturing unit at Hardwar, because of floods in the rivers enroute.
However, there might be more positive news from the two units of Vallur near Chennai. The 2x500 MW Vallur Thermal Power Project is jointly owned by the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Company and the public sector power generator NTPC.
The first unit of the project was linked to the grid in March but is not yet operating at full capacity due to problems with coal handling facilities. As it usually happens, the project faced a number of teething issues which have since been solved.
Another source in BHEL said Unit I of Vallur is being re-started today and would reach full load in a couple of weeks. The unit would generate around 350 MW in a week’s time and then take a week more to go up to 500 MW, the source said.
The source said the North Chennai Unit II would also be stabilised at be able to produce 600 MW by March.
Thus, by March, Tamil Nadu would have its share of 400 MW from Vallur, another 600 MW from North Chennai and yet another 600 MW from the new unit at Mettur, not to forget its share of power from the Kudankulam nuclear power plant.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.