New Delhi: India has retired 99 old thermal power units totalling 8 GW between 2018 and October 2023, Minister for Power and New and Renewable Energy RK Singh told the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. “The capacity of about 8,059.92 MW comprising 99 units of inefficient and old thermal power generation units has already been retired from Jan, 2018 to 15.10.2023,” said Singh in a written response to a question raised in the Upper House of Parliament.
Commenting on the decarbonisation efforts underway in the power sector, the minister said, “Many TPPs have adopted use of efficient technologies i.e. from subcritical to supercritical and now using ultra-supercritical technology in order to improve efficiency, thereby reducing coal consumption and emissions. A total capacity of Supercritical/ Ultra-supercritical units of 63830 MW (92 Units) and 2120 MW (03 units) has been commissioned respectively till 31.10.2023.”
As on October 31, national thermal capacity of 25,091.91 MW (25 GW) have been added to the grid since FY 2018-19, the minister informed the House.
“A total of 186.46 GW capacity from non-fossil fuel-based energy resources has been installed in the country as on 31.10.2023, which includes 178.98 GW Renewable Energy and 7.48 GW nuclear power. This is about 43 percent of our total power generation capacity. By 2030, India will have 50 percent of its installed power generation capacity from non-fossil sources,” said Singh.
The Ministry of Power is implementing a market-based mechanism, namely, Perform, Achieve and Trade (PAT) scheme to enhance energy efficiency in energy-intensive large industries, including thermal power stations consuming more than 30,000 tonnes of oil equivalent (toe) of energy per annum. Under this scheme, 226 thermal power station are covered, accounting for capacity of around 197 GW. “This scheme mandates all Thermal Power Stations to reduce their Net Heat Rate over a period of three year cycle which in turn reduces coal consumption and hence result in CO2 emissions reduction. Until 2020-21, saving in terms of energy is about 7.21 million tonnes of oil equivalent (mtoe), which is equivalent to emission reduction of about 27.51 million tonnes of CO2 from these Thermal Power Plants (TPPs),” the minister informed the House.
