The Bengal government is redrawing proposed power projects in the state due to difficulties in acquiring land.
The government had planned to set up four power plants in Birbhum, Purulia Murshidabad and Burdwan districts during the 11 th five-year plan period for an additional generation of 3,390 mw, but all the projects had to be stalled.
GD Gautama, state power secretary, told FE that the government is reworking land requirements as well as the plant size to add power capacities to the state.
Debashish Sen, managing director, West Bengal Power Development Corporation Ltd, (WBPDCL) said while the entire plan for the Katwa project in Burdwan district is being redrawn, for Sagardighi?s units 3 and 4 in Murshidabad district, WBPDCL has floated tenders for setting up 2x500mw units.
?WBPDCL has started acquiring land for implementing the Katwa thermal power project, which was supposed to be the biggest of all the projects planned,? Gautama said.
WBPDCL had initially planned to set up a 2,400mw project in two phases and the government issued a notification in 2005 to acquire 1,625 acres for it. But subsequently it scaled down its land requirement to 1,000 acres, though it did not come out clear on the plant size.
According to WBPDCL officials, the plant size was revised to 2×660 mw, though no decision has been taken on it.
Sen said currently WBPDCL has 337 acres in possession at Katwa and will shortly start putting up a boundary wall. ?In fact we are not decided on the plant size and are looking at various technological options to set up the largest possible plant on the minimum possible land. But we have in principle decided to have more than one unit at Katwa to get the benefit of economies of scale,? Sen said.
However, Sagardighi, which has two units of 300 mw each, is currently generating steadily. WBPDCL expects to place the work order for units 3 and 4 by March 2010. ?This would be WBPDCL?s first mega power project, which is entitled to benefits like waiver of duties for importing foreign plant and equipment,? Sen said.
The Sagardighi units 1 and 2, which were set up by Chinese Dongfang Electric Corporation, was hit with several post commissioning problems. The plant had several breakdowns and was unable to produce commercially till recently.
Sagardighi, as a project, was planned to have six units and a total of around 1600 acres was acquired for that purpose. So unlike Katwa land would not come on the way of implementing the Sagardighi project, Sen added.
In fact, in Katwa immediately after the government gave notification of acquiring 16 moujas, which made 1,625 acres, the local people formed a Krishijami Krishak O Khet Majoor Bachao Committee and resisted acquisition. The government, already entangled in land acquisition at Singur and Nandigram, did not force its way to acquire land in Katwa.