“Four gasification projects will help in framing up technical and financial viability of coal gasification.” said by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi while inaugurating the webinar on Energy for Sustainable Growth here today. Coal Gasification was one of the six topics which was deliberated in six concurrent sessions. This is the ninth webinar in the series of post-budget webinars addressed by the Prime Minister.

Dr. Anil Kumar Jain, Secretary , Coal addressed the webinar organised on coal gasification by Ministry of Coal. He stressed on suitable business model, so that not only public sector but also private sector takes role in setting-up of coal gasification plant. In the Webinar, six eminent speakers participated including Dr. V.K Saraswat, member NITI Aayog.  Dr Saraswat stressed on setting up demonstration plants to scale up indigenous technology and  introduction of PLI scheme for setting up Coal Gasification Plants. He suggested rationalisation of pricing of coal for gasification on the parameters such as taxations, State Cess, transportation and handling charges and acceleration on the projects planned by the Coal India Limited and subsidiaries preferably through EPC approach for production of chemicals & fuels.

During the session,  highlights of both the existing plant of JSPL and plant under construction of TFL, were shared by Shri VR Sharma, Managing Director, Jindal Steel and Power Limited and Shri SN Yadav, Managing Director, Talcher Fertilizer Limited. Further, Shri Yadav pointed out key enablers of coal gasification such as development of indigenous technology, formulation of Policy for consistent quality & uninterrupted supply of coal and challenges face by TFL.

Session was attended by more than 100 experts and during question answer session no. of interactions were made. Further R & D of Thermax plant & BHEL plant were shared. CIL Chairman also expressed his readiness to join hands with BHEL in the development of indigenous coal gasification plant to produce Ammonium Nitrate.

In the second session Shri VK Tiwari, Additional Secretary, Coal highlighted six key takeaways which were Availability of Coal for Gasification Projects, Development of Indigenous Gasification technology on commercial scale, Development of indigenous technology for production of methanol from syngas, Suitable policy provision for Marketing of indigenous product derived from Coal Gasification, Financial assistance to Gasification projects at Initial stage and taking up of all business models for setting up of projects.

Additional Secretary (Coal) concluded by stating that by all these steps,  coal gasification target of 100 MT of domestic coal by year 2030 will be achieved creating to a new path of sustainable coal utilization.