NEW DELHI, May 22 � Assam may be reeling under massive power shortages, but Union Power Minister is still sitting on the proposals to grant long-term coal linkages to Chandrapur and Margherita thermal power plants.
Applications seeking long-term coal linkage and Letter of Assurance (LoA) for setting up 60 MW thermal power project at Chandrapur and 500 MW Margherita project were received by the Ministry of Coal and sent to Ministry of Power for recommendations. The Ministry of Power has so far not recommended these projects for grant of LoA, disclosed Minister of State for Coal, Pratik Prakashbapu Patil in a Rajya Sabha reply by Naznin Faruque.
NTPC is setting up a 750 MW power project at Bongaigaon. One unit each of 250 MW is likely to be commissioned during 2013-2014, 2014-2015 and 2015-2016, for which Ministry of Coal has already issued instruction to Coal India limited to sign Fuel Supply Agreement for supply of coal, the Minister added.
Meanwhile, Minister of State for Power, KC Venugopal said that Government of India has signed an MoU on energy cooperation under which 250 MW of power, out of the unallocated power of coal based power generating stations of NTPC will be allocated for supply to Bangladesh.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Environment and Forest has justified the clearance accorded to Demwe Lower Hydro Power Projects on Lohit river in Arunachal Pradesh. Environment clearance was accorded according to provisions and procedures laid down under the Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 2006.
