Glitch in Seal-oil System Thwarts Commissioning of NTPC's Farakka Unit

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The scheduled commissioning date for NTPC Limited's (BSE:532555) (New Delhi, India) Farakka Super Thermal Power Station has been pushed back once again. The cause, this time, is a fault in the seal-oil system, which was supplied by Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BSE:500103) (BHEL) (New Delhi).

According to NTPC sources, during a trial run last week, the sealing system attached to the turbo-generator of the under-construction unit has been found to have a minor leakage, calling for an immediate shutdown of the unit. The system is now being refurbished. The seal-oil system serves as a guard to prevent the escape of hydrogen gas from the generator along the rotor-shaft joints.

Because of this incident, the 500-megawatt (MW) unit is now expected to begin operations in mid-March rather than the previously scheduled commissioning date of February 2011. All pre-commissioning activities such as boiler lighting, completion of steam blowing, placing the turbine generator on barring gear and turbine rolling have been wrapped up, and the unit is expected to achieve full load soon. The commercial generation from the unit is, however, likely to be delayed further due to the ongoing fuel crisis at the Farakka plant.

It has been estimated that around 300 tonnes of coal per day will be required to run the new unit at a 70% plant-load-factor (PLF). The plant, located at Nabarun in the Murshidabad district of West Bengal, meets its fuel needs from the linked mines in the Rajmahal Coalfield area of Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL) (Ranchi, Jharkhand), as well as through imports from overseas coal mines. The water requirement for the plant is met from the Farakka Feeder Canal.

The Farakka Super Thermal Power Station, which was commissioned in January 1986, has an installed generation capacity of 1,600 MW through three 300-MW units and two 500-MW units that were constructed in the early 1990s, under the Phase-II expansion of the project. The ongoing Phase III expansion entails the installation of a 500 MW-steam turbine unit with the associated balance of plant components to enhance the capacity of the plant to 2,100 MW.

The cost of the expansion is estimated to be $567 million. The coal-fired plant supplies power to the states of West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Sikkim, Assam and Tripura.

For additional information, see February 24, 2011, article - NTPC, BHEL Gear Up to Synchronize 500-Megawatt Farakka Unit.

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