Thermal power is rest with hope

New government, several new policies and promising private investments, yet the thermal power needs new rays of shining light
India has been experiencing rapid economic growth, but the power sector continues to lag behind. The policy makers have introduced several progressive measures, but the growth isn’t still progressive. Tariffs and the dependence on imported fuels are on the rise and the poor health of T&D continues to inhibit the inflow of investments. The nor-so-powerful sector needs to fix these challenges in pursuit of becoming powerful.
In the next 10 years, India’s power demand is likely to cross 300 GW. Meeting this demand means, we need a fivefold to tenfold increase in the capacity addition, and coal contributes 69 percent of India’s primary commercial energy. Coal is considered as the best option for commercial use.
Though the Power Ministry is working hard to increase the share of renewable energy, the coal-based power is likely to remain India’s most important source of energy for the coming decade or two.
Coal-based thermal powerCoal-based thermal power generation is the best option for India due to the supposedly abundant indigenous availability of coal with proved reserves of about 123 billion tonnes. The installed capacity in India has increased from 756 MW in 1947 to about 125,000 MW in 2012, with coal-based capacity contributing 58 per cent of India’s power generation capacity and 71 per cent of total electricity generation in 2012.
However, India’s per-capita electricity consumption — 900 kWh per year — is very low. It is one-third of world’s average. Then there are about 32 per cent of the population without electricity access and poor quality of supply in rural areas. In the 12th Plan, the government has proposed about 63GW of coal based-capacity added by 2017.
ChallengesThe Indian thermal power sector is facing a gamut of challenges like inefficient planning, lack of private investments, inadequate maintenance, low plant load factor and erratic supply to consumers.  The biggest challenge in power sector is transmission and distribution losses. There are some states like Bihar lose almost half of its power even before it reaches to the consumers.

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