NTPC plans long term steam coal offtake deal

Saturday, 01 Oct 2011

BS reported that NTPC is planning to strike a long term offtake deal with coal companies abroad to match its increasing demand. But due to the higher price range the firm might restrict the import component of the total coal use to 10%though it is looking for acquisition of coal blocks outside India.

Mr Arup Roy Choudhury NTPC Chairman and Managing Director said “We are thinking about signing a long term coal import deal with foreign companies. This would be vital, as we are planning to acquire some blocks in Indonesia, Australia and Mozambique,”

On the other hand, regarding the power producer plan to cap import component to 10 per cent he said that the aim is to source 70% of coal from the Kolkata based Coal India remaining 20% from the firm eight captive mines and about 10% from imports which include the production from acquired mines abroad. The company captive mines have a reserve of 1.8 billion tones. Set to come out of ICVL

Mr Choudhury said “The assets that ICVL had identified are mainly of coking coal. Which can only be used for steel industry requirements? While regarding the Indonesia plans of ICVL, the local government has also decided to ban exports of coal below that calorific value which could have been our requirement.”

The company’s coal requirement for the financial year 2011-12 would be around 160 million tonnes which is expected to zoom to 240 million tonnes in the next year. While this year, NTPC total CAPEX is INR 26,000 crore and it will require investments worth about INR 30,000 crore per year over the next 10 years for expansion plans.

(sourced BS)