PALATANA, UDAIPUR, September 3 (TIWN): For the first time OTPC plant achieved the full-load generation of 363MW. This is the base load of Unit-I. Earlier maximum generation was 350-353MW. At 7.30am this morning an OTPC engineer told TIWN over phone , " At 6.30am this morning our plant achieved the full load. Now the plant is running at 363MW. First time we have achieved the target of 363MW. Actually during this shut down of 12 days due to Major Inspection of Gas Turbine, we have done some maintenance in the Steam Turbine. It resulted in the improvement of power generation. Naturally a jubilant atmosphere among all the OTPC staffs as well as GE experts and Sojex Oman India Pvt Ltd team.

Earlier Update till midnight 4am, Wednesday

Earlier Due to the non-functioning of Purge Valve of the Gas Turbine, General Electric experts once again had to shut down the Unit-I of 726.6MW Combined Cycle Gas Turbine(CCGT) Thermal Power Plant on Tuesday evening. Due to the non-functioning of Purge Valve of the Gas Turbine, General Electric experts once again had to shut down the Unit-I of 726.6MW Combined Cycle Gas Turbine(CCGT) Thermal Power Plant on Tuesday evening. The shutdown began at 6.30pm. Throughout the day GE experts supervised the power generation procedure but full-load(up to 350MW out of 363.3MW) generation could not have been possible even for a single time. At this GE expert engineer from Hyderabad unit detected that the Purge Valve of the Gas Turbine is not working. Immediately shut down was given in Unit-I. It is learnt that it may take six to seven hours to bring the Purge Valve in working condition. If it is done, full load(at least 350MW) target may be achieved on Wednesday morning.

Purge Valve is a crucial equipment of the Gas Turbine. Unless it works properly full load generation is not possible. A top level OTPC official told TIWN at 8.30 pm on Tuesday, " At present it is impossible to start repair work as no one can go near the GasTurbine due to tremendous heat. However, it is expected that by mid night or by early morning of Wednesday the expert of General Electric can sort out the problem. Actually it will take one and half hours to put the Valve in motion once the Gas Turbine cools down." It is to be mentioned that after 12 days production began from the Unit-I of the OTPC plant at 9pm on Monday when the Gas Turbine was synchronized.

        Meanwhile giving a serious slam to the speculation of the possibility of Unit-II starting production the OPTC official told TIWN over phone, " It will be the biggest surprise of the year if Unit-II starts production before Durga Puja. " Only on Monday ONGC Tripura Asset Manager V P Mahawar hinted media that ONGC will start gas supply to Unit-II soon and thus the Unit-II of OTPCwill be operational by September end. Reacting to this a top level OPTC official said , " Yes, I have seen in paper about the 16 inch gas pipeline for OTPCs Unit-II but practical situation is far from any assumption. Even if Gas supply begins right from this week , it is impossible to make Unit-II ready for Commercial Generation. Only if the BHEL & OTPC work without any stoppage , trial run may be a possibility. But I don't see any possibility of Commercial Generation before the end of this year." He said that after the horrible experience from the UnitI, BHEL too is unwilling to do anything in haste. BHEL suffered a huge loss by acting under pressure from the state govt to start the commercial generation in June 2013 though the plant was not at all prepared for this. As such two Gas Boosters got severely damaged and more than 3 months were taken by the BHEL's Hyderabad unit to repair them. If the same thing is repeated in case of Unit-II the future of the plant will be under serious question, said the OTPC official.