The Meja supercritical thermal power plant (SCPP) is a 1,320MW coal-fired power project located in Uttar Pradesh, India.
The project is owned by Meja Urja Nigam (MUNPL), a 50:50 joint venture of India’s state-owned National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) and Uttar Pradesh Rajya Vidyut Utpadan Nigam (UPRVUNL).
The Meja power plant will comprise two coal-based units of 660MW capacity each.
The site survey began in April 2008, while the project received an environmental permit from India’s Ministry of Forestry in January 2011.
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The Meja supercritical thermal power plant is located in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Image courtesy of Hans Permana.
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The second unit of the Meja supercritical thermal power plant will be operational with 660MW capacity in December 2020. Image courtesy of Vikramdeep Sidhu.
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The Meja supercritical thermal power plant will have a total installed capacity of 1,320MW. Image courtesy of James House.
Unit 1 was commissioned in April 2018 and the second unit is expected to be commercially operational by December 2020.
Location and site details
The supercritical thermal power plant is located near Kohadhar, Bhagdeva, and Mai Kalam villages in Meja Tuluk of the Allahabad district, Uttar Pradesh, India.
The project site is located approximately 45km away from Prayagraj and approximately 50km away from Allahabad airport.
The site is connected with the Meja-Khiri road on Allahabad-Mirzapur highway and has proximity to the Meja Road railway station located on the Allahabad-Mughalsarai section of India’s North Central Railway.
Meja supercritical thermal power project details
The Meja supercritical thermal power project components include the main plant building, coal handling system, fuel oil handling system, water treatment and reuse system, cooling towers, chimney, and ash handling system, switchyard, residential buildings, and other ancillary infrastructure facilities.
The boilers for the project are designed to handle imported and domestic coal in a ratio of 70:30. The domestic coal supply for the project will be procured from South Eastern Coalfields (SECL), the largest subsidiary of Coal India (CIL).
Project financing
A total of 16 banks including the State Bank of India agreed to provide a syndicated loan of £872m (Rs75.7bn) for the project in June 2012.
The Japan Bank of International Corporation (JBIC) signed a loan agreement with the State Bank of India (SBI) to provide an export credit line of £7.3m ($12m) for the procurement of steam turbine generator equipment in September 2014. The total loan amounting to £12.9m ($21m) was co-financed with the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ.
The capital expenditure requirement of £787.8m (Rs66.08bn) for the second unit of the project was financed through India’s Power Finance Corporation (PFC) under an agreement signed with MUNPL in July 2017.
Transmission details
The electricity generated at the Meja power plant will be evacuated through a 252km-long, 132kV overhead transmission line along the right-of-way of the Allahabad–Mirzapur national highway 35 (NH-35).
Contractors involved
BGR Energy and Toshiba were awarded an engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contract for the project in April 2012.
BGR Energy was responsible for the supply boilers while Toshiba Corporation, Japan, and Toshiba JSW Turbine and Generator (Toshiba JSW) were in charge of the delivery and installation of the supercritical steam turbine and generator island packages (STG) for the project.
State-owned BHEL was awarded the contract for the coal handling plant package for the Meja SCPP in October 2012.
Techno Electric was contracted for the supply, inland transportation, insurance, installation, testing, commissioning of switchyard package for Meja SCPP in 2014.
NTPC awarded a £227.55m (Rs17.8bn) contract to General Electric (GE) for the supply of wet flue gas desulphurisation (FGD) technology for four of its coal plants including the Meja SCPP in October 2018.