(a) whether there are several thermal power plants in the country which have become unviable;
(b) if so, the details of total number of such plants along with their power generation capacity;
(c) the details of estimated amount required to help these power plants to overcome financial crisis; and
(d) the steps taken by the Government for the revival of the said plants?
THE MINISTER OF STATE (INDEPENDENT CHARGE) FOR POWER
AND NEW & RENEWABLE ENERGY
( SHRI R. K. SINGH )
(a) : Yes, Madam.
(b) : A list of 34 Stressed Thermal Power Plants received from Department of Financial Services is Annexed.
(c) : There is no information available on this in this Ministry and in the Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance.
(d) : Govt. of India has taken following steps to resolve the issues related to stress in power projects:
I. Fuel Linkages under SHAKTI: The Government has approved a new coal linkage allocation policy on May 17, 2018 named SHAKTI (Scheme for harnessing & allocating koyla transparently in India). Under the
scheme, auction of coal linkages for Independent Power Producers (IPPs) with PPAs based on domestic coal has been conducted on September 12, 2017. IPPs having PPA but no coal linkages have participated in the auction and linkages have been granted to 11549 MW capacity (10 projects) including five stressed projects of total 8490 MW capacity, and these projects have been resolved. Under B(i) provision of SHAKTI scheme, linkages have been granted to States/ Central Gencos for 8870 MW for 10 projects.
II. Pilot project for procurement of 2500 MW: In order to address the problem of lack of Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) in the country, The Ministry of Power has notified a scheme for procurement of 2500 MW on competitive basis for a period of 3 years from the generators with commissioned projects having untied capacity. Under the scheme, PFC Consulting Ltd. invited bids for 2500 MW of power wherein PTC India Limited acted as an aggregator of demand for purchase of power from the power projects and sell that power to states utilities. Bids have been received from 7 (seven) projects for aggregate power of 1900 MW. Letter of Award (LOA) has been issued to all the successful bidders (1900 MW).
III. DISCOM Payment Monitoring App PRAAPTI: A new App PRAAPTI (Payment Ratification and Analysis in Power Procurement for Bringing Transparency in Invoicing of generators) has been launched by the Ministry of Power to bring more transparency in the payment system by DISCOMs. The generators are being actively encouraged to feed in their invoicing and payments data in the portal.
IV. Steps taken to reduce the cost of generation:
a. The introduction of third party sampling by Central Institute of Mining and Fuel Research (CIMFR): The Government has started third party sampling of coal at both loading and unloading end of coal supply from CIL to Generators.
b. Coal linkage rationalization:
• Ministry of Power vide letter no 5/3/2015-OM dated 10th June, 2016 had issued the policy on flexibility in utilization of domestic coal for reducing the cost of power generation for central generating companies and state power utility.
• MoP vide letter no 5/3/2015-OM dated 20th February, 2017 had issued the methodology for use of coal by States in private generating stations.
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