India's Power Sector

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VKumar
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by VKumar »

Mort Walker wrote:
Theo_Fidel wrote:It is all accounted for. Maybe at at one time not any more. Things are a lot more efficient now. There is a reason demand growth is crawling even as the population is much more prosperous than 20 years ago. There is also a lot of low hanging fruit in terms of efficiency and losses to draw on.

Right now India per capita is running about 1,200 kwhr per capita. Just increasing existing thermal to 90% lf and reducing line losses will doube this. Ultimate demand may peak at 4000 kwhr +/- Think about this with my numbers a family of 5 in India will be using about 12000 kwhr per year residential and another 10,000 kwhr per year industrial. That is a lot of power. Even here in wasteful midwest, my personal split is 11,000 kwhr per year PV and 5,500 kwhr per year grid. Family of 6 right now. Plus 2 EV's.

- A/C. Modern high efficiency A/c will not need more than 1 ton to cool a 1200 sqft apartment. About 2000 kwhr / year family of 5. 1/4 time run.
- Modern Refrigerators need less than 400 kwhr per year.
- Washing machines, Water heater, TV, etc. Less than 1000 kwhr per year.
- Space heaters, negligible. Probably run at low demand periods anyway.
- People shouldn't count on village demand. Residential needs in villages are astonishingly small numbers. In the 1980's I did the numbers for GOI where about 5,000 MW of capacity would have covered all the villages in India. Even with double the population.
- the first wild card is industrial demand. World over industry takes a 2/3 share of power. But India seems to be moving into more services. For good reason, we are not resource rich.
- Second wild card is picking up transportation with EV's. Family of 5 needs about 2000 kwhr to go 20,000 km/year India. Per person maybe 400 kwhr.

There is scope for growth. But you should be realistic. There is a lot of uncertainity on what the grid total demand will be long term. My suspicion is that ALL the thermal power India will ever need has already been installed. so why are folks still proposing thermal power? Who knows, cheap money, bad planning, institutional capture, all of the above. There is a term called 'stranded assets' that is doing the rounds.

Keep in mind the family that can afford all these contraptions, first thing they will do is put solar panels on their roof. That will kill 60% to 100% of your grid residential demand. Even here in 'wasteful' midwest every 10th house has a PV system already. In California parts it is already 1 of 3 and per new rules will be 100%. all corporates are already defecting to their own RE power plants, even in India.
Right now the CEA states that there is a deficit of around 1% every month. Of course this doesn’t account for growth. Right now the price of electricity must come down relative to per capital incomes.

Thermal coal cannot compete with natural gas. With the Russian Gazprom deal, should it go through, there will be more gas fired plants. It’s unlikely there will be new coal plants.
1200 sq.ft apartment will need at least 7 ton of ac to cool.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Mort Walker wrote:It's actually both. Power is priced too high in India at nearly Rs. 8/unit (KWHR). It needs to be less than Rs. 4/unit. Some subsidies will be required. In fact, energy as a whole is priced too high in India and fuel taxes must be brought down, but both the center and states need that revenue. It would have been ideal to bring fuel under GST, but that didn't happen as it would have actually reduced taxes for the consumer.
It is not just the price of power that needs to be less than Rs 4/unit. That is just one part of the variable. It is the overall burden of electricity on the household income that needs to be reduced.

Power at Rs. 8/Unit translates to approx. 0.12 USD/Unit. Which is what the average rate is in US. Also an average US household consumes about 900 KwH per month or @108 USD per month. Mean household income is @72000 per year or @6000 per month.

Hence in dollar terms in US, an average household pays some @2% of their pre-tax income. In India to maintain the same level of electricity consumption, an average household will have to shell out @20% of their pre-tax income.

The only way energy parity can be can be achieved for Indians is to double their energy efficiency and double the income and half the energy cost.

That is, the cost of electricity at consumer should be Rs. 4/unit, the energy efficiency should be increased 2x per unit consumed and further household income should double.

On the later part, the household income is on track to double by 2025. However the energy efficiency should be increased 2x and price needs to be brought down. And here technology can help.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Theo_Fidel wrote:I

- A/C. Modern high efficiency A/c will not need more than 1 ton to cool a 1200 sqft apartment. About 2000 kwhr / year family of 5. 1/4 time run.
- Modern Refrigerators need less than 400 kwhr per year.
- Washing machines, Water heater, TV, etc. Less than 1000 kwhr per year.
Some serious miscalculations. Given that India is a tropical country and the quality of construction being shoddy with lot of leaks, 1 ton A/C will cool barely 200 sq. ft.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Lot needs to be done in India needs to get to power nirvana, some suggestions:

1. Energy efficient Green buildings

Both Residential and Commercial buildings need to be green, literally. For example building technology should evolve that constructing "tree house" https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/ ... -singapore should be easy.

Rooftop gardens, fly-ash lime or fly-ash cement bricks, self cleaning glass walls, better architecture, centralized A/C should be made a priority.

The input material itself needs to adhere to standards. The code of building standards and builders including the common mason need massive skill development and better licensing.

2. Energy efficient transport., basically onus on public transport. Moving masses of people efficiently. For last mile connectivity, small buses.

3. Urban renewal. Several homes/apartments/commercial residences need to be incentivized to convert to green.

4. Better energy distribution. Net metering should be made a priority. Basically quality energy access, less line losses etc.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by nandakumar »

This news about the Hoover dam would warm the cockles of Theo Fidel. He has been for long a votary of pumped storage.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/201 ... nergy.html
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Gyan »

Theo_Fidel wrote:Gyan,

Have there been any India CSP bids recently. Is it getting closer to pv Rs 3 / kWh number
No major CSP project or Offshore wind electricity project has been awarded in India at the moment.

China is getting into this game in a very big way.

Best prices were obtained by Dubai for CSP which IIRC are around US Cent 8 per kwh for 16/24 hour power. Combination of PV + CSP can bring it down to 7 cents. While adding power back up & grid modernisation will increase it to 9 cents.
Theo_Fidel

Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Theo_Fidel »

Gyan,

That's a shame. Despite higher cost right now GOI should bid out smaller 100mw type plants every year. Doesn't break the bank but keeps the tech improving.

If we can kick off offshore wind with 1000mw we can surely do least 100mw of CSP

Nandakumar,

Yes,yes and yes. Just to beat the drum one more time, India has the western chats. Easy 2,000 ft elevation change.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by SivaR »

Theo Sir,
Tamilnadu already has 400MW Kadamparai pumped storage in use since 1987. It has more than 2GW potential, but due to the health of SEB it is not proceeding quickly. The Kundah (500Mw) and Sillahalla(1000MW) are in papers since 2000, but still not moving at speed. Attached link for recent CEA meeting minutes, they are mentioning about some study of power evacuation from these projects.
http://www.cea.nic.in/reports/committee ... g/42nd.pdf
With TN's huge renewable potential, these should be executed in war footing to complement the renewable sources.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Solar based power just will not solve any problem. It is just enough to soften the peak loads.

Here is a very good article on nuclear power:

https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/why-the-w ... r-strategy
Theo_Fidel

Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Theo_Fidel »

Siva saar,

Agreed.
Thx for the link. Do you know whar the mwhr capacity of kadamparai is?
SivaR
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by SivaR »

^^^
I am not sure about the MWHR capacity. The recent presentation from national workshop on Pumped storage gives wealth of information about its potential. It is estimated ~ 100GW. The Europe's harnessing of pumped storage, Indian scenario and the way forward.
The presentation from Mr.NAMASIVAYAM Sr.Engineer - Tangedco, gives the history of Kadamparai and full of lessons learnt(very rare to see this kind of lessons learnt documentation in India). Hope these are taken seriously and improvised.
http://www.keralaenergy.gov.in/files/pd ... 2_2018.pdf
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by A_Gupta »

India’s Supreme Court Tuesday refused to halt a lower court from hearing cash-strapped power producers seeking protection from bankruptcy proceedings.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... wer-assets
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Related story from econ thread:

NPA crisis at Indian banks is mostly because of bad loan concentration in this one sector: Power
India’s government seems intent on abandoning good ideas for dealing with the country’s banking crisis and encouraging bad ones. Perhaps that shouldn’t be surprising, given that the bureaucrats don’t yet seem to have grappled with the real nature of the problem.

The latest terrible proposal for dealing with the bad loans weighing down India’s state-owned banks, which control more than two-thirds of deposits, is to create a “bad bank” — an asset-management company that would take stressed assets off their balance sheets. Naturally, the scheme emerged from a committee made up of the heads of India’s nationalized banks.

Ownership of the new company would be shared between banks and private investors. It would have to raise at least 1 trillion rupees (about $14.5 billion) for an alternative investment fund from various pools of capital in the private sector. Why so much? Because the company will have to act as a market maker for stressed assets that nobody wants, picking up 15 percent of an agreed-upon floor price.

This is the real issue. There are already quite a few private-sector asset-management companies lurking around now that India has finally instituted a real insolvency code. The problem isn’t that they don’t have enough money, it’s that not enough of the stressed assets being put on sale look good enough to buy.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by JTull »

India to test gas-fired plants as ‘peakers’ to supply uninterrupted power supply
Gas-fired power plants can be useful when solar-fired generation peters and coal plants take time to begin their operations.

India will test a plan to operate its underutilised natural gas-fired power generators as “peaker” plants that can switch on quickly when there’s high demand, according to the country’s power planning body.

The project will start with four NTPC Ltd. plants with a combined capacity of 2.3 gigawatts that will run only in the evenings, Central Electricity Authority Chairman Pankaj Batra said in New Delhi. The agency envisions 20 gigawatts of gas-fired capacity being used as peaking stations to even out supply fluctuations from the large amount of renewable energy that’s set be built by 2022, he said.

“The government will start testing the plan this month by operating one of NTPC’s gas-based power plants as a peaking station” for nearly four hours in the evening, Batra said in an interview last week, adding that the three other plants will be online by the end of the year. State-owned GAIL India Ltd. has agreed to supply gas to the four plants, he said.

India has an ambitious goal of installing 175 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2022, or a little more than the country’s current peak demand, as part of its Paris climate pledge to cut carbon emissions. Gas-fired power plants can play a role balancing the grid by maintaining uninterrupted electricity supply, especially when solar-fired generation peters out in the evenings and coal plants take time to ramp up.

The gas facilities will be run on fuel produced in India, which is in short supply, and running them as peakers will optimise use of the fuel, Batra said. A shortage of domestic gas has kept the utilisation of India’s 25 gigawatts of gas-fired plants at about a fifth of total capacity, according to CEA data. The cost of gas imports for India makes the fuel uncompetitive with other sources of baseload power.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by PratikDas »

The University of Newcastle, Australia: Electric partnership powers energy innovation
Could these organic printed solar cells help solve Australia's energy crisis one day?

A new renewable energy market is fast becoming a reality thanks to this creation from UON physicist Professor Paul Dastoor, with the support of commercial partner CHEP.

Read more ➡️ http://t.uon.nu/printedsolar


The catch:
The Centre of Organic Electronics, which Professor Dastoor is the Founder and Director of, also recently produced the highest-ever performance of solar paint cells at 2.5 to 3 per cent. The cells can already produce at lower light levels than existing solar-based silicon cells with installation costs approximately one-tenth of installing a silicon solar system.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by VKumar »

Anil Ambani has sold his power distribution company Reliance Power to Adani group. Reliance Power used to be BSES - BOMBAY SUBURBAN ELECTRIC SUPPLY CO.LTD.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by pankajs »

https://www.livemint.com/Industry/XZjpG ... oject.html
Odisha plans ₹3,000 crore energy storage project
New Delhi: India is increasingly looking at hydro pump storage schemes, rather than battery storage, for utility scale projects to solve its energy storage problems. One such instance is the proposed 600 mega watt (MW) pump storage plant of the state-run Odisha Hydro Power Corp (OHPC) to be set up at an investment of ₹3,000 crore to meet peak-hour rural electricity demand.

OHPC will partner with the private sector for the project planned near Upper Indravati multi-purpose reservoir, which already has an operational 600 MW hydropower plant. The idea is to use cheap solar power during off-peak hours to raise water to a height and then release it into lower reservoir to generate electricity.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Vasu »

India readies a slew of power sector reforms
The government has readied a raft of power sector reforms, including implementing the direct benefit transfer (DBT) scheme in the electricity sector for better targeting of subsidies, freeing renewable energy from licensing requirement for generation and supply, and promoting retail competition.

According to the draft amendments to the Electricity Act, 2003, which is available on the power ministry’s website, the government is trying to give consumers wider choice by promoting competition in the distribution sector and addressing contracting issues with medium- and long-term power purchase agreements.

The government has been pushing for separating the so-called carriage and content operations of existing power distribution companies, and electricity supply business.

According to the draft amendments, there will be a price cap for electricity tariffs in a particular area under which multiple supply licensees can operate.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

Patanjali has entered solar business.

https://www.financialexpress.com/indust ... =Dailyhunt
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

India overtakes USA as second larger solar installations market in H1 2018
India installed 4.9 GW of solar power, consolidating its position as the second largest solar market in the world, during the first half of calendar year 2018. The country was ranked second, following China during the January-June period, according to a report by Mercom Communications India.

India was the fifth-largest solar market in the world for total installations, the study, ‘India Solar Market Leaderboard 1H 2018’, said. “New leaders are emerging in the highly-competitive Indian solar market, while some of the more established companies maintained their leadership position in the first half of 2018,” said Raj Prabhu, CEO of Mercom Capital Group.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

Bihar has become 100% electrified under Saubhagya scheme.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Vips »

Rural electrification in full swing, connecting 7 lakh homes a week.

Rural electrification is galloping ahead with power lines connecting about 7 lakh homes every week as authorities are working overtime to ensure that every household that wants electricity should be linked to the grid by December 31.

The rapid growth is generating demand for electricity, which is good news for power plants because many are running below optimum capacity. It is also expected to significantly improve the quality of life in underdeveloped regions, apart from stimulating demand for bulbs and appliances.
Of the 3.56 crore households that were not connected, 2.1 crore have been electrified.

Experts said, within a year, the newly connected households will contribute significantly to power consumption because of pent-up demand in many regions and fresh rural demand.

“Electricity consumption growth has been robust in the last few months, also aided by growth in household electrification and reduction in power cuts,” Feedback Infra founder chairman Vinayak Chatterjee said. This would require fresh investment in power generation to meet future demand.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently said India’s move to energise every village in the country with electricity was one of the greatest success stories in the world this year. IEA, the global energy watchdog for the developed world, said such initiatives improve productivity that enhances economic well-being. It can also spur innovation which can boost micro-businesses, agricultural yields and help people get access to schools, banks and medical services, experts in the IEA said.

Power minister RK Singh said 15 states have completed electrification while another eight are close to achieving complete household electrification. States like Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh and Chhattisgarh are left with small number of un-electrified households and expected to achieve saturation any time, he had said last Thursday, exuding confidence that the government will achieve the complete household electrification targets by December 31.

Peak power demand of the country crossed 180 GW in October for the first time.

Data available on the power ministry’s Saubhagya dashboard showed that Uttar Pradesh has the maximum 56 lakh of the total 84 lakh un-electrified households. Rajasthan, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Assam and Meghalaya are some of the states that have un-electrified households.

Association of Power Producers director general Ashok Khurana said the country needs to commercialise coal production to help deliver the required electricity in the next three to four years.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

^^^Of the 347 GW capacity, 190 GW comes from coal. If coal production is going to be commercialized, expect coal power to become a bigger player. Either that or stay in the dark for the near term.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Modi government just 28,000 households away from reaching 100% electrification
Only 28,594 households have been left to be electrified across the country, according to the official data by Ministry of Power. Of the number, while 20,134 households are left in Chhattisgarh, 8,460 are yet to be electrified in Rajasthan, the Saubhagya dashboard showed. To date, 16,94,616 and 7,07,727 households have been electrified in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, respectively.

The Saubhagya scheme envisages providing last mile connectivity and electricity connections to all remaining households in rural as well as urban areas to achieve universal household electrification.

Achieving 100 per cent household electrification was one of the aims of the present government. However, it could not meet the self-imposed deadline of December 2018 for the scheme. For a village to qualify as ‘electrified’ under the scheme, power cables from the grid need to reach a transformer in every village and only 10 per cent of its households, including public places (schools and health centres) need to be connected.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

Mort Walker wrote:^^^Of the 347 GW capacity, 190 GW comes from coal. If coal production is going to be commercialized, expect coal power to become a bigger player. Either that or stay in the dark for the near term.
No one wants to finance coal plants or mines any more. It is simply not competitive.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Rishirishi wrote:No one wants to finance coal plants or mines any more. It is simply not competitive.
I think the above statement is a little too broad based.

There is metallurgical coal which is used to process iron ore into steel. It simply *cannot* be replaced. Then there is thermal coal for power generation. And both of the above are actually very lucrative.

Here is Australian coal exports (2016) -> https://archive.industry.gov.au/resourc ... t-COAL.pdf.

For every talk of wind turbine and solar power, there should be concomitant talk about coal. Yes, for every tonne of steel refined several kilos of coal is consumed.
• Metallurgical coal is a non-substitutable raw material in the production of steel from iron ore.
• Every tonne of steel needs about 800kg of metallurgical coal and there is more than 200 tonnes of metallurgical
coal in every wind turbine.

• Coal is expected to continue to account for a large portion of the world’s electricity generation for decades to come.
• High efficiency low emission (HELE) and carbon capture storage (CCS) technologies are available and can reduce
emissions from coal fired power plants substantially.
1 tonne of coal powers the average Australia household for approximately 4 months.
Interestingly, Australia exports 39% of its total exports by volume to Japan. China is 22%.

Australia exports 25% of its total exports by volume to India for metallurgical coal.

---

I am citing Australia since it is one of world's biggest producer and exporter of coal.

Hence to say that 'no one wants to finance coal plants or mine any more' is a very very broad brush. The reason Solar plants are popular in India is because of its quick gestation, low capex and low turnaround.

Solar PV is point solution for taking the edge off the peak load. Cheap base load is still needed and for that India has to invest in Coal & Nuclear.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Good post. Always more helpful to the forum when a post quotes reference data rather than simply make a sweeping assertion with no basis or reference.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Theo_Fidel »

We have the technology now to move beyond expensive base power. Its need is declining all the time, even in India.

I don't think the point about Met Coal is correct any longer. The world esp. USA is moving to a Electric Arc and DRI(Direct reduced Iron) process. It is coming to India too, even if it is coal syngas right now, natural gas else where.
https://www.jindalsteelpower.com/sustai ... plant.html

Rishi,

The financing around the world has moved away from coal. Do you have visibility in how financing within in India is shifting. Last I saw there is about $30 Billion of coal power plants in trouble. How is CIL’s finances?
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

disha wrote:
Rishirishi wrote:No one wants to finance coal plants or mines any more. It is simply not competitive.
I think the above statement is a little too broad based.

There is metallurgical coal which is used to process iron ore into steel. It simply *cannot* be replaced. Then there is thermal coal for power generation. And both of the above are actually very lucrative.

Here is Australian coal exports (2016) -> https://archive.industry.gov.au/resourc ... t-COAL.pdf.

For every talk of wind turbine and solar power, there should be concomitant talk about coal. Yes, for every tonne of steel refined several kilos of coal is consumed.
• Metallurgical coal is a non-substitutable raw material in the production of steel from iron ore.
• Every tonne of steel needs about 800kg of metallurgical coal and there is more than 200 tonnes of metallurgical
coal in every wind turbine.

• Coal is expected to continue to account for a large portion of the world’s electricity generation for decades to come.
• High efficiency low emission (HELE) and carbon capture storage (CCS) technologies are available and can reduce
emissions from coal fired power plants substantially.
1 tonne of coal powers the average Australia household for approximately 4 months.
Interestingly, Australia exports 39% of its total exports by volume to Japan. China is 22%.

Australia exports 25% of its total exports by volume to India for metallurgical coal.

---

I am citing Australia since it is one of world's biggest producer and exporter of coal.

Hence to say that 'no one wants to finance coal plants or mine any more' is a very very broad brush. The reason Solar plants are popular in India is because of its quick gestation, low capex and low turnaround.

Solar PV is point solution for taking the edge off the peak load. Cheap base load is still needed and for that India has to invest in Coal & Nuclear.
List of banks that has stopped financing coal plants.
https://www.banktrack.org/page/list_of_ ... inesplants

Cancelled coal projects in India.
http://ieefa.org/india-coal-plant-cance ... -expected/
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Rishirishi wrote:
List of banks that has stopped financing coal plants.
https://www.banktrack.org/page/list_of_ ... inesplants

Cancelled coal projects in India.
http://ieefa.org/india-coal-plant-cance ... -expected/
This brings up a good point. New coal plants are simply expensive to build and operate compared to natural gas, but that does not mean the existing ones will shut down - they will still be part of the energy mix for India for some time to come. The banks which have ended coal mine and coal plant financing are primarily European. In India, large power plants have all been expensive and per unit energy costs are quoted too low. Operators of power plants expect state electricity boards and governments to bail them out if they're in financial trouble.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Theo_Fidel wrote:We have the technology now to move beyond expensive base power. Its need is declining all the time, even in India.

I don't think the point about Met Coal is correct any longer. The world esp. USA is moving to a Electric Arc and DRI(Direct reduced Iron) process. It is coming to India too, even if it is coal syngas right now, natural gas else where.
https://www.jindalsteelpower.com/sustai ... plant.html
From the above link:
Direct-reduced iron (DRI), also called sponge iron is produced from direct reduction of iron (in the form of lump, pellets or fines) by a reducing gases produced from natural gas or coal. This reduction takes place in the temperature range 800- 1050 degrees C when reducing gases; mainly Hydrogen and Carbon-monoxide; react with the iron oxides to produce iron.
How can one defeat basic chemistry? Iron oxide is reduced to Iron using gases (carbon monoxide & hydrogen) produced from coal or natural gas. In nutshell, a cheap source of carbon is always required. Currently it is coal.

It does not matter if the furnace is electric arc or cinder block. Coal is an input. And millions of tonnes of coal is required. That was the case two years back and will be the case forward.

Here is another link https://www.businessinsider.com.au/coal ... nce-2018-2

Reproducing in full:
Citibank has upgraded its price forecasts for thermal and coking coal over the next two years

It expects strong demand from southeast Asia and China, the world’s largest consumer

Prices are likely to be supported by a sharp decline in new mine investment in recent years

Coal prices look set to stay higher for longer.

That’s the view of Citibank’s commodity research team who expect limited growth in Chinese coal output to underpin prices for both thermal and coking coal over the next two years.

“We now expect medium-term coal prices to stay ‘higher for longer’, and raise our thermal coal price forecast for 2019 to $85 a tonne from $75 a tonne and forecast for 2020 to $80 a tonne from $65 a tonne,” Citi says.

“We also revise up our medium to long-term coking coal price forecasts, albeit more modestly, by $10 a tonne per annum to $138 a tonne for 2019 and $130 a tonne for 2020.”

Here are Citi’s new price forecasts.

Source: Citibank

Citi says its forecast upgrades are based on the assumption that China should remain a strong coal importer from the seaborne market for the rest of this decade, pointing to rising domestic coal production costs and limited prospects for large-scale supply growth due to stricter environmental and safety regulations.

“This should see seaborne coal stay competitive for much longer than previously expected,” it says, referring its thermal coal forecasts.

“We therefore anticipate tight supply and demand balances in the seaborne market associated with high price volatility, due to a lack of spare capacity to cope with major disruptions and/or demand spikes during the winter heating season.

“Further, global growth appeared stronger than earlier expected, supportive of power demand particularly in emerging market countries, including South and Southeast Asia where a wave of new coal-fired power projects are expected to come online in the next few years.”

As for the outlook for coking coal prices, Citi says prices over the medium term should be supported by a lack of spare capacity globally.

“Falling investment capex during the past decade has resulted in low spare coking coal capacity in the Chinese domestic and seaborne market,” it says.

“Therefore major disruptions could weigh heavily on the markets and create price spikes.”

Pointing to the chart below, Citi notes that capital expenditure from coal producers has fallen by around 70% in both China as well as outside of China, likely resulting in constrained seaborne supply growth going forward.

“Set against moderate demand growth in short to medium term, driven by Southeast Asia, this lack of investment in the supply side should be supportive for prices and producer margins,” it says.

“Further, the reduction in coal mining capex may leave coal prices prone to spikes on unanticipated supply disruptions.”

While Citi has upgraded its coking coal forecasts, it says prices are unlikely to enjoy as much upside because of greater availability of steel scrap in China and expectations that Chinese steel production will start to turn negative by 2020, limiting overall demand for coking coal.
One cannot just wish away coal just because one does not like it. Coal is the *cheapest* form for base load. A cleaner form is nuclear.
disha
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Rishirishi wrote:
List of banks that has stopped financing coal plants.
https://www.banktrack.org/page/list_of_ ... inesplants

Cancelled coal projects in India.
http://ieefa.org/india-coal-plant-cance ... -expected/
Thanks for the link.

In the first link, all banks are "western" banks. It points to my theory that the net energy generation has peaked in developed countries and since developed countries have other options, they can restrict the economic prosperity of developing nations. And an inability to finance new projects in developed countries is signaled as a virtue for "caring of environment"!

You see, there is direct correlation between HDI and per capita energy consumption to a certain level. Even India has not reached that level. So if one wants to use thermal power which is relatively cheap, can be done at scale and the technology is well understood., they will be locked out of all financing to add power capacity!!

The second link is even more illuminating:
This is not to say NTPC is abandoning coal power generation any time soon. NTPC has 47 GW of existing coal generation and it has been selectively acquiring equity stakes in financially distressed state coal power plants such as the Nabinagar Power Generating Company and Kanti Bijlee Utpadan Nigam Limited in Bihar in June 2018.

India’s coal-fired power sector woes reflect the combination of excessive financial leverage, operational inefficiencies and competition arising from accelerated deflation in renewable energy tariffs

NTPC started 2017/18 with a development pipeline of 25 GW of new coal plants. Shelving 10.5 GW since February 2018 represents a dramatic recognition of the dynamic state of the Indian electricity sector and size of the disruption from renewables. But it is not the end of thermal coal, not least given Indian thermal power plants have an average 25-40 year lifespan and the majority were only commissioned in the last decade.
BTW, PV Solar has *max* lifespan of 25 years with average around 20 years in current commercial PV installations. Residential solar is mixed. I will not be surprised if the residential solar requires complete rebuild after 15 years of operation! Further efficiency decreases with time for PVs. Here is an example (from a brochure) https://us.sunpower.com/solar-panels-te ... ar-panels/

______

India cannot afford to have a *moralistic*, particularly developed world driven *moralistic* attitude towards its power generation. India needs cheap base load generators and cheap peak load "peakers". In fact, India should be aiming for Rs 3/Unit (or 5 cents/KwH) cost structure for electricity produced.

India per capita consumption is waaaay behind -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... onsumption

An average icelandic consumes @40x more than an average Indian. The Norwegians consume @20x more energy per capita than an average Indian. In fact, we are so poor that our per capita energy consumption is less than half the world average!

We are in a dire need of a national campaign to double our base load generation every 5 years. And that doubling can only come from Coal and Nuclear.
Last edited by disha on 27 Feb 2019 13:05, edited 1 time in total.
disha
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by disha »

Suraj wrote:Good post. Always more helpful to the forum when a post quotes reference data rather than simply make a sweeping assertion with no basis or reference.
Thanks. Much appreciated.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

New Wind And Solar Are 20% Cheaper Than India's Existing Coal Power

Similar to the United States, it’s increasingly difficult for Indian coal generation to compete economically with fast-falling renewable energy costs, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).

https://www.forbes.com/sites/energyinno ... cc84924c0f

Solar panels only last for 25years. However the rest of the infrastructure (stands, inverters , cables etc last much longer). Solar has little running costs. Once the investment is made, just harvest returns. It is an exellent choice for farmers in dry areas. Inflation eats up much of the costs. Power tarifs may go up, but the costs stays constant and over time, diminish to nothing.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

coal is struggling. In Germany the gov had to guarente for the power plants, so they do not close down. I recently heard that their new strategy is to offer running on 50% capacity. It takes 3 days to start up a coalplant. The the time to ramp up from 50% to 100% is significantly shorter.

India needs to get rid of coal gradually. It is expensive, dirty and eats up a lot of capacity of the railways.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Theo_Fidel »

Rishirishi wrote:India needs to get rid of coal gradually. It is expensive, dirty and eats up a lot of capacity of the railways.
Rishi,
Yup! Yup! & Yup!
To which I will add, coal is now yet another material we import in ever increasing amounts only to foul up our air.

But you can have a reasoned argument with all sorts of spreadsheets and still be wrong.
And the supporters of coal have consistently been wrong and caused the nation a $40 Billion debt nightmare.

RE is cheaper and is technology based power. It never depletes. It is already cheap will keep getting cheaper. Coal is resource based and as it depletes keeps getting more expensive. Same is true of nuclear. You are fighting a battle you are certain to lose as RE technology keeps improving.

I said the same thing back in 2006 here on BRF and I have no doubt I will say the same thing here in 2032. Back then Solar was $200 / MWh. And less than 0.01% of generation. Folks would have long reasoned posts on how it will never be 1% of generation. All of them are gone. And by 2032 this round of nay sayers will be gone as well.
Rishirishi
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

Theo_Fidel wrote:
Rishirishi wrote:India needs to get rid of coal gradually. It is expensive, dirty and eats up a lot of capacity of the railways.
Rishi,
Yup! Yup! & Yup!
To which I will add, coal is now yet another material we import in ever increasing amounts only to foul up our air.

But you can have a reasoned argument with all sorts of spreadsheets and still be wrong.
And the supporters of coal have consistently been wrong and caused the nation a $40 Billion debt nightmare.

RE is cheaper and is technology based power. It never depletes. It is already cheap will keep getting cheaper. Coal is resource based and as it depletes keeps getting more expensive. Same is true of nuclear. You are fighting a battle you are certain to lose as RE technology keeps improving.

I said the same thing back in 2006 here on BRF and I have no doubt I will say the same thing here in 2032. Back then Solar was $200 / MWh. And less than 0.01% of generation. Folks would have long reasoned posts on how it will never be 1% of generation. All of them are gone. And by 2032 this round of nay sayers will be gone as well.
Spot on. I never understood the anti RE fundametalists. They had an argument when RE was expensiver. But now???? It is almost as if they have decided that the world is a better place with unsustainable solutions.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Not being an anti-RE person, but just asking since I like reading about numbers as I spend most of the time in econ thread - what is the import content of our electricity sector in general, and RE sector in particular ? How much of the transformers and inverters are imported ? PV cells ? Wind turbine blades, generators ? If domestically made, how to they compare to the current state of the art ?
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