Staff Reporter

State-run NTPC’s power projects in West Bengal, Bihar and Orissa are the worst-affected in the eastern region due to the ongoing coal supply crisis as actual generation at these plants is much lower than targeted. “Problem in the eastern region power plants of NTPC is mainly due to coal shortage and coal-handling problems,” a Central Electricity Authority (CEA) official said. The coal at these project sites is supplied by Eastern Coalfields Ltd, a subsidiary of state-owned Coal India. “Eastern Coalfields is supplying coal to NTPC’s eastern region plants… Coal transportation, which is through railways, is a problem, therefore, the hiccups,” the official said. As per CEA data released on October 22 this fiscal, the generation target of a combined 30,597.58 million units from these plants for the April 1-October 22 period was missed, with production of only 25,970.75 million units, a 15.12 per cent shortfall. On October 22 alone, NTPC had set a power generation target of 154.42 million units, but was only able to produce only 139.50 million units, translating into a shortfall of about 15 per cent vis-a-vis the target, according to the data. “Generation at the eastern region plants is lesser than targeted because of coal supply constraints at Kahalgaon, Farakka plants,” an NTPC official said. NTPC has four plants in the eastern region – the 2,100-Mw Farakka (West Bengal) unit, 2,340-Mw Kahalgoan (Bihar) plant, 3,000-Mw Talcher Kaniha facility and 460-MW Talcher thermal project in Orissa. “Coal India assigned the job of supplying fuel to eastern region power plants to Eastern Coalfields Ltd, thinking that it would be able to excavate more coal for NTPC plants,” the official added. The situation has arisen because the coal mines allocated for the eastern region projects — with a total capacity of seven million tonnes — are situated in ‘no-go’ areas, where the Environment Ministry has banned mining on the ground that it will adversely impact the environment. “One of the mines has been given the green signal and the second one is yet to obtain the go-ahead. The first will start mining now,” the official said. According to the company, the expansion of the Rajmahal mines that feed NTPC’s Kahalgaon and Farakka projects from 10 million tonnes to 17 million tonnes is also long overdue. “Fourteen million tonnes more coal is required,” the official said, adding that the coal requirement at Kahalgaon had gone up after the commissioning of three 500 Mw units. Rajmahal Coalfields is working to complete the expansion project before the end of the ongoing XI Five-Year Plan (2007-12).  

The Asian market for wind energy is disappointing with main drivers China and India seen to post barely flat growth in terms of annual installed capacity, says an expert.

Clean energy is now more than a fad and it is becoming a commitment for everyone in the region including ADB which re-affirms commitment to increase financial support to clean energy investments to $2billion a year by 2013 from $1.8 billion last year.

Except in Japan, the construction of nuclear power plants hasn’t been stopped.

Countries are raising the standards and safety precautions of nuclear power plants, not only in Asia, but all over the world as well.

Ten years ago, California’s power crisis finally ended. Shortly after, Enron would file for the largest bankruptcy up to that point in US history. With myriad consultants alternately proclaiming either that “it wasn’t our fault”, “it could happen to you” or “we know what really happened”, restructuring initiatives were scaled back or stopped in China, Indonesia, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

The future of nuclear power generation is in Asia.

In devising policies, and pursuing its nuclear energy industry, China will strive for all of: 1) National independence for nuclear power technology; 2) Control and independent management of the fuel cycle; 3) Fuel diversity in the electrical power generation industry; 4) Significant source for electric power; 5) Reduction in emissions of air pollutants and CO2; and, 5) Commercialization of an indigenous reactor design, including high temperature gas cooled reactors – pebble bed module (HTR-PM) reactor technology. The current efforts to arrive at up to 40 GWe of nuclear generation capacity by 2020 will only have a limited impact on the current shape of China’s electricity industry.

Energy is an integral part of economic activity. An adequate energy supply is essential to support industrial activities, fuel the mobility needs for both freight and passengers, and ensure convenience and comfort in life. To facilitate such economic activities, large-scale investment in energy supply infrastructure is necessary, including the upstream oil, gas, and coal; midstream transformation facilities for electric power generation, oil refinery, and gas processing; and distribution networks that can deliver energy to customers. To meet the rapid energy demand growth of 2.4% per year until 2030, the Asian Development Bank estimates that Asia and the Pacific will require a cumulative investment of between $7.0 trillion and $9.7 trillion in the energy sector. Most of the total investment in the energy sector will be concentrated in China, India and Japan and dedicated to electricity generation, transmission and distribution.

India has made impressive progress in the field of electricity generation since Independence in 1947. In terms of generation, while new capacity has been added, the gap between demand and supply has, by and large, increased.

The Smart Grid Utility space is quickly evolving and is a market that will start to accelerate.

The growth in the use of private finance to fund major public infrastructure projects throughout Asia continues unabated. Yet the Asian power sector faces the hurdle of trying to balance industrial and consumer demand with a sound environmental sustainability strategy.

What is Geothermal Energy? As the world takes measures to move towards lower carbon energy production, many forms of renewable energy technology have been developed. Geothermal energy is heat (thermal energy) that is generated and stored within the core of planet Earth. It is generated from the difference in temperature between the inner core and the surface of the Earth. When compared to other formed of renewable energy production geothermal is considered one of the most promising forms of production. To harness geothermal power involves drilling up to five kilometres below the Earth’s surface and pumping water into the Earth’s core where it is naturally heated before returning to the surface where the heat energy can be used through transfer to generate electricity and/or heat. Mitigating Geothermal Development Risks Whilst the concept is simple, construction of the required infrastructure requires significant development cost both in terms of drilling works and uncertainty over the volume of water that can be efficiently pumped and what temperature increase it will achieve. This often constitutes a major barrier to investment for the sector. For a project to have good chances of success a thorough sub-ground analysis is required, which can cost up to several million dollars. Only once this analysis is completed can actual success of a project be estimated. Should the sub-ground analysis work only identify a thermal capacity which is not sufficient to allow economic operation of a geothermal power plant, all investment made in the analysis work will be lost. Historically there has been no ability to insure risks inherent wit development of geothermal power; however Marsh in Germany has now developed a service that can assess project specific risks before the commencement of any drilling works and significant capital expenditure being incurred. The team is working to expand availability of the geothermal power risk assessment so the service can be made available for all Geothermal Power plants globally.  

Global investment in low-carbon energy could just probably go up to $270 billion at most this year from a record $243 billion in 2010.

Smart meters that show consumers’ energy consumption won’t be enough to reduce use, studies show.

Dismal interest in renewable energy resulted in only 18% of its 350MW installed capacity target achieved for 2005-2010, says the Malaysian government.