New Delhi: China’s Wuhuan Engineering Co Ltd was Tuesday awarded a lump sum turnkey (LSTK) contract to build India’s maiden urea plant based on gas produced from coal at a cost of Rs 13,277 crore by September 2023.
The project in Talcher will convert 2.5 million tonne of coal and 0.35 million tonnes of petcoke into syngas that would be used to make 1.27 million tonne of urea, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said at the contract signing ceremony.
“The Talcher Fertilizer Plant was shutdown in 1999 due to financial losses. Twenty years later, we have handed over work order for revival of the same,” Dharmendra Pradhan said. “The project will be commissioned by September 2023,” the minister added.
The gas produced from process called as coal-gasification will be competitive in price when compared to natural gas, Pradhan said.
Wuhuan Engineering Co Ltd was selected as the LSTK contractor following rigorous tendering process. Pradhan said Wuhuan has rich EPC (engineering, procurement, and construction) experience in coal gasification plants.
In order to augment the domestic urea capacity, revival of closed fertilizer units of Fertilizer Corporation of India Ltd (FCIL) has been top priority agenda of the government.
Talcher Fertilizer Limited has been allotted northern part of North Arkhapal mine as captive mine for meeting its coal requirements and petcoke will be sourced from Paradip refinery of IOCL.
PTI
