Related Topics: Government Schemes & Initiatives, E-Governance
News
Union Minister of State for Power and New & Renewable Energy (IC) and Skill Development & Entrepreneurship and the Union Minister for Coal, Mines and Parliamentary Affairs have jointly launched PRAKASH (Power Rail Koyla Availability through Supply Harmony) portal.
Background
- The portal has been launched at a time when coal inventory at power plants are reduced to 20 MT at September 2019, sufficient to last for 11 days on an average.
- According to analysts, total inventory at power plants and coal companies now stand at 40 MT only.
- Coal production in the country declined 4% annually to 304 MT in the first six months of FY20, mainly due to excessive rains hampering mining operations.
- However, state-owned miners Coal India and Singareni Collieries have increased their supplies to the power sector by 66% annually to 426 MT in the same period.
Need for the Portal
- Present mechanism to review coal supply situation consists of an Inter-Ministerial Group which has officials from Ministries of Power, Coal, Railways, CEA, power utilities and coal companies.
- This group holds weekly meetings to review coal supply situation as well as railway logistics.
- It was observed that this mechanism faced several issues such as scattered information, correctness of data from different organizations, timely availability of data etc.
- This often led to difficulties in decision making.
About Prakash Portal
- It is developed by National Thermal Power Corporation Limited (NTPC) and sources data from different stakeholders such as Central Electricity Authority (CEA), Centre for Railway Information System (CRIS) and coal companies.
- To present information in a user friendly method, the Portal gives graphical representation of reports with details shown on the map of India.
Reports
Currently, the Portal will make available four reports as detailed below –
Daily Power Plant Status
- This report gives Station data related to power generation, coal receipt, consumption and stock.
- Report can be generated utility wise, state wise and sector wise (default utility-wise).
Periodic Power Plant Status
- The Report gives Station data related to power generation, coal receipt, consumption and stock for selected period.
- Coal materialisation based on dispatch by coal company is available.
Plant Exception Report
- This report gives materialisation and rakes in pipeline through Rail.
Coal Dispatch Report
- Report gives coal subsidiary wise dispatch for particular period.
- It also gives source wise details of coal dispatch.
- Dispatch trend is also shown.
- Plant wise and siding wise details are available.
Benefits of Portal to the Stakeholders
- Coal company will be able to track stocks and the coal requirement at power stations for effective production planning.
- Indian Railways will plan to place the rakes as per actual coal available at siding and stock available at power stations.
- Power stations can plan future schedule by knowing rakes in pipe line and expected time to reach.
- Ministry of Power /Ministry of Coal/ CEA/ POSOCO can review overall availability of coal at thermal power plants in different regions.
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