Talcher fertiliser plant revival delayed; only 63.75% work completed after a decade
BHUBANESWAR: More than a decade after the Centre initiated steps to revive the Talcher Fertiliser plant and redevelop it as the country’s largest and first coal gasification-based urea unit, it continues to remain non-operational due to inordinate delay in execution of the project.
Talcher Fertiliser Ltd (TFL) was among the five fertiliser plants in the country taken up for revival in 2014.
The revival of four other plants at Sindri (Jharkhand), Barauni (Bihar), Ramagundam (Telangana) and Gorakhpur (Uttar Pradesh) announced during the same time have been completed and the units are now functional.
Sources said TFL, a consortium of four state-run companies, was established in December 2014 to revive the Talcher unit at an estimated cost of over Rs 13,270 crore to produce 12.7 lakh tonne urea per annum by leveraging coal gasification technology. The contracts for coal gasification and ammonia urea package were awarded to Wuhan Engineering Company Ltd (WECL), China by TFL in September 2019. The project was severely affected as Covid-19 pandemic struck in December the same year, having its epicentre at Wuhan.
Locals and former employees of the plant are displeased with the prolonged delay in execution of the project which was to be completed by September this year. “The revival of Talcher Fertiliser Ltd is a beacon of hope for industrial and economic growth in the region. We were rendered jobless after the sudden closure of the plant more than 20 years back. We were hopeful after the revival plan was announced. But the delay is disappointing,” said Bijay Mallick, an ex-employee.
The Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers recently acknowledged that the progress of the project was affected due to Covid pandemic that led to a backlog in procurement, construction and equipment erection by WECL. “Around 63.75 per cent of the project has been completed so far. The outside pipe rack, renovation of non-plant buildings, boiler-1 and raw water treatment plant are in advanced stages of completion,” Union minister Anupriya Patel informed this in the Parliament.
The minister said efforts are being made by TFL for completion of the project with regular reviews with WECL, China engineering team to resolve the pending engineering issues. “The TFL has also started deducting mutually-agreed damages from bills of WECL since July under the existing contract provisions due to slow progress and delays in project completion,” she added.
In 1971, FCIL had set up the Talcher unit over an area of 902 acre to produce urea using coal as feedstock and the production commenced in 1980. The unit, which was once producing 900 tonne ammonia and 1,500 tonne urea a day, fell sick in 1992 due to frequent power restriction, obsolete and mismatch of technology and was closed by 2002.