Birla Corp to Switch to CBM at Bengal Unit

Birla Corporation has decided to go with coal bed methane gas rather than coal for its Durgapur plant owing to the long-term risks associated with coal prices, DNA newspaper has reported.

Not just the 14 mw captive power plant, Birla Corp would be using coal bed methane gas to run key equipments at the unit. The company would be setting up a dedicated pipeline to bring the gas to its plant and wouldn't be storing the same.

The switch would mean consumption of 5,110 tonne of coal a year would be avoided, and the plant would instead use 90,000 standard cubic metres per day of CBM to keep the operations running.

The Durgapur plant is located in a region that houses the country's first commercially developed CBM site. Great Eastern Energy and Essar Oil have been producing gas from this block and selling the same to nearby industrial clusters.