AGARTALA, April 11 (TIWN): Monarchak Gas turbine situated at Sonamura sub-division being readied for start power generation from Monday, said NEEPCO Monarchak GM & Project Head S R Biswas on Saturday. According to the sources from Monarchak, the power generation from the plant could not reach to the 65 MW with its capacity on its initial stage during the test run. Talking to TIWN on Saturday Biswas said Biswas said, “We have conducted all sorts of tests that was required to start the power generation from the turbines based on gas.” Adding to that he said that gas turbine has been readied to start the generation of power from Monday onwards.

The total capacity of the power plant at Monarchak is 100 MW, out of which 65 MW of power will generated through gas from the ONGC and the rest 35 MW of power will be generated using the waste gas. The same procedure was taken up at Palatana OTPC.Biswas also said that as of now there is no problem with the gas from ONGC. “We have already synchronized our turbines at Monarchak and no disturbances were found as of now.” 

Asked about the commercial generation of power from the plant, Biswas said it will take another couple of months to start the commercial power generation.

On March 11 the gas turbine of the power plant situated at Monarchak under Sonamura Sub Division synchronized its turbine successfully with the generation of 9 MW of power on its initial stage. And later again the turbines were synchronized as asked by the TNGCL.

It may be recalled here that the ONGC had already charged gas into the 10 km pipeline from Khedabari - Sonamura GCS, to its Gas Metering Terminal at NEEPCO –Monarchak.

The foundation stone of the Monarchak project had been laid by former power minister of NDA regime (current railways minister) Suresh Prabhu in 2002 with an estimated project cost of Rs 623 crore. Northeast India's biggest and the first-of-its-kind 5MW capacity solar power plant in Tripura has begun commercial production from Monarchak under Sonamura sub division. The solar power plant was set up at a cost of Rs.40 crore. The entire power from the plant is being transmitted to the Tripura power grid now.