CIL to set up plants for coal gasification: Goyal

NEW DELHI: To promote environment-friendly uses of coal, Coal India is planning to set up plants for coal gasification, Parliament was informed on Wednesday.

To promote cleaner and alternate use of coal, CIL is pursuing initiatives for setting up plants for gasification of coal and its further processing into downstream chemicals, Coal and Power Minister Piyush Goyal said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha. "In this direction, CIL has formed a JV company along with RCF, GAIL and FCIL, namely; Talcher Fertilizers Ltd to set up a coal based Ammonia-urea plant at Talcher, Odisha, through surface coal gasification route," Goyal said.

He said the government has already taken several initiatives to improve the efficiency of coal based power plants and to reduce carbon footprint.

All new, large coal-based generating stations have been mandated to use the highly efficient supercritical technology, he said.