The Rajasthan Government has approached the Centre for allotment of a lignite block either in Barmer-Sanchore or Bikaner-Nagpur basins in western Rajasthan for the proposed underground coal gasification project.

The project will be undertaken by Rajasthan State Petroleum Corporation Ltd, jointly with a private partner. RSPCL is a wholly owned subsidiary of the State-owned Rajasthan State Mines and Minerals Ltd.

A company source told Business Line that “The State Government approached the Coal Ministry in March requesting allotment of a block. According to the available information, the Centre is considering the proposal favorably. We are expecting a positive development by the end of April.”

RSPCL has received expressions of interest (EoI) from 13 companies to participate in the project. The bids were received against a tendering process initiated in early 2010-11.

Among the prominent bidders are Adani Power, TATA Power, Essar, Shiv-Vani, Abhijeet group, JSW Energy and Simon India Ltd (a wholly owned project management subsidiary of Zuari Industries of the K.K. Birla group). The source said that “Once the block is allotted to us we can go ahead with the final tendering process to select the private sector partner for the project.”

According to the company, exploration in western Rajasthan identified clean lignite deposits that are not easy to be mined and suitable for such projects.

UGC projects are undertaken in assets having rich resources but considered technically difficult to be mined to produce Syngas through in-situ gasification process using injection of oxidants in the coal seams.

(Sourced from BL)