With only six days of coal reserves, production resumed at Rampal coal-fired power plant at 11:03pm on Wednesday.
Unit-1 of the power plant started commercial production on the night of December 17, 2022. However, the unit, having 660MW capacity, was forced to shut down on January 14 due to shortage of coal supply.
The authorities of the power plant were unable to open any letter of credit (LC) to import coal due to the dollar crisis.
After a lot of persuasion at the government's policy level, LC-opening was allowed for importing coal and the supplier sent a consignment of 30,000 metric tons.
“The imported coal reached the jetty of the power plant on February 9 so we have resume operation at unit-1 of the plant from Wednesday,” Anwarul Azim, deputy general manager of the Bangladesh-India Friendship Power Company Limited (BIFPCL), said.
“5,000 tons of coal per day is required to run one unit of the plant. So, the centre will work for six days on this coal. It takes seven to 10 days for a ship from Indonesia to arrive at the jetty of the power plant. Another coal ship will arrive on February 18 with another 55,000 metric tons of coal,” he added.
The BIFPCL, a joint venture of Indian state-owned NTPC and Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB), is the owner and operator of the Rampal power plant.