India reviews sulphur-reduction programme for coal-fired power plants

• 13 days ago (2024-12-25)
• David Flin

Asia 907 Coal 302

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India is reviewing a 10-year-old $30 billion programme that requires coal-fired power plants to install equipment to cut sulphur emissions. The Indian government said that its studies have demonstrated that this equipment has little impact in reducing pollution.

Around 540 power plant units were required to install flue-gas desulpherisation (FGD) systems by 2026, but only around 8 per cent have done so. As a result, government officials have proposed using locally made electrostatic precipitators to remove fine particles from the emissions. The National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) said that Indian coal has a low sulphur content. R Srikanth, head of the engineering school at NIAS, said: “All our cities actually suffer from high particulate matter pollution, not from sulphur dioxide pollution.”

Companies have been reluctant to install FGDs because they don’t want to shut down the power plants for 45 days to allow installation.

Environmental groups say coal-fired plants account for about 80 per cent of industrial emissions of sulphur and nitrogen oxides in India. A Greenpeace report states that India is the world’s largest emitter of sulphur dioxide, most of which is generated by coal-fired power plants.