The Hindu Business Line : Haldia dock to appeal to coal panel for higher linkage

Rakes handled
In October, the dock handled 41 rakes against the linkage of 62 rakes per month and in November 59 rakes. The figure so far this month has been 34 rakes, likely to be the close to the linkage by the end of the month.

A file picture of the Haldia port.

Kolkata , Dec. 20

The Haldia dock authorities are to appeal to the coal linkage committee for a higher monthly linkage of 3.5 lakh tonnes of thermal coal for coastal shipments during the coming quarter (January - March 2007).

Haldia dock was granted a low linkage (for Tamil Nadu Electricity Board) of 2.2 lakh tonnes a month for the current quarter (October-December 2006) and yet it could not handle the stipulated volume due to several reasons, the non-availability of coal being the main.

"We should get the linkage of at least three lakh tonnes a month for the next quarter," according to Mr Rajeev Dube, Deputy Chairman of Kolkata Port Trust in charge of Haldia dock. "We're fully geared to handle the traffic," Mr Dube told Business Line.

Revamping of facility

The optimism is because the dock authorities have initiated several steps to handle more thermal coal traffic. First, the handling facilities at the dock have been revamped such that the rate of tippling improves, and with it the ship loading. Second, the dock authorities have succeeded in persuading Eastern Coalfields Ltd (ECL) to step up its supply and Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) its offtake through the dock.

In fact, the Deputy Chairman, as it was pointed out, held several meetings with the coal company, Railways, TNEB and others concerned in this regard. The effort yielded results. "The first three quarters were bad due to various problems which have since been tackled and the situation is improving now," Mr Dube observed.

In October, the dock handled 41 rakes against the linkage of 62 rakes per month and in November 59 rakes. The figure so far this month has been 34 rakes, likely to be the close to the linkage by the end of the month.

It might be noted that there has been a sharp drop in the thermal coal throughput in the Haldia dock so far in the current year as compared to the same period of last year.

Drop in output

Between April and November this year, the thermal coal throughput was 1.54 million tonnes (mt) compared to 2.56 mt in the same period of last year, thus registering a drop of more than a million tonnes. At this rate, in 2006-07, the dock, the authorities had feared, would have been nowhere near the last year's (2005-06) total thermal coal throughput of 3. 4 mt.

The drop in thermal coal traffic had taken its toll on the dock's total traffic throughput which so far in the current fiscal increased marginally at 29.7 mt (29.5 mt).

Fortunately, crude lighterage at the Sandheads has started and the throughput so far has been 1.7 mt compared to 1.62 mt in the same period of last year and the bulk of the crude, about 90 per cent, discharged at the Sandheads came to Haldia with only a meagre 1.74 lakh tonnes, roughly 10 per cent of the total, to Visakhapatnam port for second round of discharge.