The NLC India Ltd has issued a consultancy order to Engineers India Ltd for its 4 MW green hydrogen plant in the Neyveli area which is expected to be completed by the financial year 2024-25, the company’s Chairman and Managing Director Prasanna Kumar Motupalli told FE.
“They (EIL) will be helping us with procuring the electrolyser for the green hydrogen plant. The order is in the temporary stage and the tender will come by March of this financial year,” he said.
Presently, NLC has 1.4 GW of renewable capacity and plans to take it to 6 GW by the year 2030. “For that, 2 GW projects are in pipeline. One in the state of Gujarat, one in Rajasthan and one in Tamil Nadu,” Motupalli said. The green hydrogen project will further add 4 GW to the total renewable capacity.
To align its targets with the government’s goal in expanding the conventional based energy, the company plans to invest Rs 500 crore in the next 4-5 years for the modernisation and efficiency improvement measures in its existing thermal power plants.
To increase the dispatches of coal from its mines, the company is working towards widening of coal transportation system and roads, it said. “We had a capex plan of Rs 2,000 crore for the Talabira mines of which we have spent Rs 1,400 crore and the balance Rs 600 crore is dedicated for railway expansion,” Motupalli said.
In the April to November period, the company dispatched 6.5 million tonnes of coal, 3.5 million tonnes via railways and the remaining via roadways, the company said. “There were some initial issues in Q1 and Q2 of FY24. Going forward, we hope to achieve the target of 14.4 million tonnes of coal dispatch,” the CMD said.
Further, the company is also in discussion with some state gencos and central public sector undertakings to supply coal from its Talabira mines and is looking for long-term supply contracts until its power plant in Talabira is commissioned by the year 2027-28.
“Some companies are approaching us for supply of coal, some central utilities as well as some state gencos,” Kumar said. “DVC and APGENCO have approached us, but nothing has been finalised yet.”
While the company aims at reaching its dispatch targets, it is also hopeful that the e-auction premiums on coal will increase to its benefit. “I expect the e-auction premiums to increase to Rs 2,000-2,400 per tonne due to rising demand for power and coal,” Motupalli said.
The e-auction premiums were at a level of Rs 1,600 per tonne so far in the current financial year on the back of excess supply of coal in the market, according to the company. NLC has set a target of producing 14.4 million tonnes of coal from its Talabira mines and aims at reaching the peak rated of capacity of 20 million tonnes by the end of financial year 2025-26.
The company recently won the North Dhadu coal block in the 7th auction of coal mines conducted by the coal ministry and is aiming to win other blocks in the ongoing 8th coal auction round which will help it in increasing the coal production.
“We are making full efforts to make this mine operational within the timeline prescribed by the government (i.e. 55 months from August) so that we can add to the production of coal,” Motupalli said. NLC expects its Pachwara south coal mine to start coal production from the first quarter of the next financial year.
The company’s current coal production capacity is at 50 million tonne and it aims to increase it to 82 million tonne by 2030. The government has time-to-time been emphasizing on the need to enhance the country’s coal-based energy to meet the rising power demand. It has intended at adding 10,000 MW thermal capacity by the end of the current financial year and 80 GW by 2030.
Of this, NLC India will be adding more than 6 GW of thermal capacity by 2030 distributed among Talabira, Neyveli, and Ghatampur.