Bengal power minister Mrinal Banerjee (centre) in Calcutta on Wednesday. Picture by Kishor Roy Chowdhury

Calcutta, April 20: Bengal wants to buy power from North Eastern Electric Power Corporation (Neepco) and other utilities in the Northeast to tide over the shortage during the evening peak period.

The state is even ready to pay more for this, said power minister Mrinal Banerjee on the sidelines of a symposium organised by the Coal Ash Institute of India.

The minister added that the demand in the current financial year has increased by 300-350 MW. ?The industrial resurgence in Bengal has created this sudden demand. The units in Durgapur consume 225-MW of power, which was unthinkable a few years back,? Banerjee said.

Before the summer set in, the state had approached Damodar Valley Corporation and Vidyut Vyapar Nigam for 200 MW and 100 MW, respectively.

DVC initially supplied the required amount but stopped when their generation failed to meet the mark, the minister added.

Similarly, Vidyut Vyapar Nigam also stopped after supplying power for a few days.

Moreover, the line reactor of Kolaghat Thermal Power Station has snapped. Kolaghat had to scale down its generation from 1150 MW to 950 MW as transport of power became a problem.

Power generation at Kolaghat will increase from Friday when the line reactor will be repaired, Banerjee said.

The minister complained that although central power utilities like National Thermal Power Corporation are supposed to supply around 800 MW, the state actually receives 400 MW.

The government had also approached Power Trading Corporation. PTC, however, has to meet the requirements of Maharashtra, which is as high as 3,000 MW per day, and has refused to supply to Bengal.

Earlier, speaking on the utility of fly ash generated from coal used in thermal power plants, he said it could be gainfully used in sectors like cement, roads and agriculture. Fly ash is a harmful industrial by-product.

West Bengal Power Development Corporation, the state-owned generating agency, exports 1.2 million tonne of fly ash to Bangladesh and West Asia.

On the government?s move to create a corpus for developing renewable energy plants in the state through a surcharge of one paise per unit of power generated by thermal power plants, Banerjee said the proposal will be tabled before the assembly soon.