Displaying items by tag: India
Jaipur Municipal Corporation plans waste-to-energy plant
08 April 2015India: The Jaipur Municipal Corporation (JMC) plans to set up small-scale waste-to-energy plant to generate electricity. A Bangalore-based private company, which has been appointed for the project management, will submit a project report in four months. The JMC plans to generate nearly 6MW/day from 650t of waste.
"At present, JMC generates close to 1250t/day of waste," said deputy mayor Manoj Bhardawaj, "Of this 1250t, 350t is used to produce refuse-derived fuel that is sold to cement plants and 250t is used to produce compost manure. We are planning to generate electricity from the remaining 650t."
India: Coal India (CIL) is likely to sign a major joint venture agreement with the India Railways to co-develop a number of railway projects to extract coal. CIL would provide the money, while India Railways would provide the labour force creating the infrastructure, including the tracks, sidings and related infrastructure.
The joint venture plan was conceived by Union railway minister Suresh Prabhu, who has been working hard to raise India Railways' share of coal transport and CIL chairman Sutirtha Bhattacharya, who has previous experience of working on similar projects for the Krishnapatnam Rail Co. The deal is expected to be signed shortly. "The terms are being worked out. We will disclose when it is finalised," said Bhattacharya.
CIL has been looking at a comprehensive revenue-based partnership with India Railways in a bid to create mega infrastructure for which about 50 separate projects across the country have already been identified. Of immediate priority would be three specific projects, including a 90km stretch linking Tori-Shivpur-Kathautia connecting the North Karanpura mines in Jharkhand, Jharsuguda-Barpalli-Sardega in Odisha and Bhupdeopur-Raigarh-Mand in Chhattisgarh. CIL is likely to invest US$643m in these three projects.
The joint venture is expected to help CIL double its coal production from the current levels to 1Bnt by 2020.
India: Cement companies that operate in East Jaintia Hills District, Meghalaya State face a precarious situation due to a ban imposed by National Green Tribunal (NGT) on the extraction and transportation of coal. As coal is a major fuel used by the cement plants in the region, its non-availability threatens to close the plants.
"Coal demand from cement plants is huge and if there is no supply, all the cement companies will have no other option but to shut down their plants," said a representative at one of the cement plants affected by the ban. He lamented that the NGT court had lifted the ban on transportation of the assessed and extracted coal for transportation to Beltola District, Assam State, only. "However, the cement plants in East Jaintia Hills have not received any coal due to the non-availability of a weighbridge in the district," he said. "Approximately 2000 - 2500 trucks are seen transporting coal to Assam every day."
India: The Pollution Control Board has despatched 20,000t of effluent sludge generated by textile units in the SIPCOT Industrial Estate in Perundurai to cement plants in Ariyalur district in Tamil Nadu state for use as an alternative fuel. Local media reports that local cement producers have started accepting effluent sludge from the dying industry after the success of a trial run that indicated no variation in the strength and quality of cement. Following the first order demand for another 8000t has been expressed.
Singareni Collieries to cut supply to cement producers
02 January 2015India: Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) has decided to cut coal supplies to the cement industry as it prioritises thermal power plants in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. Power companies in the two states use 66% of coal produced by SCCL. However, the plants have been unable to work to their full capacity in the second half of 2014 due to a shortage of coal, according to SCCL General Manager S Chandrasekhar.
The decease in coal supplies to the cement producers is expected to make prices rise. Local media reports that the coal from SCCL is more suitable for cement production than power generation as it has a high ash content of 35 – 40%. SCCL is also reported to have encountered several instances of 'misuse' of allocated coal by cement companies. 160,000t/day or 16% of the total coal production is currently allocated to the cement industry and another 6.6% is allocated to captive power plants run by cement companies.
India: The government has asked Coal India Ltd (CIL) to stay away from the initial rounds of coal block auctions due in January 2015 that are meant for the cement, power and steel industries. The state-run monopoly miner has, however, requested the government to reallocate a few blocks to it, including two that it had lost that were being jointly developed with private firms.
"We are a commercial producer of coal and we do not fit into the category for which the blocks are being auctioned," said a senior CIL official. "CIL will stay away from the first rounds of auctions." However, CIL is likely to participate in bidding when coal blocks are auctioned for commercial mining.
The company has requested that the government return the blocks that it lost following the Supreme Court's order rendering almost all allotments illegal 'because substantial investment has already been made by all parties in these blocks.' CIL had floated majority joint ventures with two private companies to undertake mining projects in those two blocks.