VIRTUAL VOCATIOANAL TRAINING REPORT

NTPC FARAKKA

2021
NTPC Farakka:
Coal Handling Plant (CHP)

Md Tadeeb Akhtar
B.E. Mechanical Engineering (4th year)
Jadavpur University
8/10/2021
 Acknowledgement

Vocational Training at NTPC Farakka Super Thermal Power Plant in this covid
crisis is very challenging. Despite of virtual training I comprehend most of the
topics explain in the online classes. I want to show my gratitude towards the
training co-ordinator Mr. Kanchan Kumar Sarkar for this opportunity to undergo
this training (July, 2021).

I also want to thank all the faculties for their effort to conduct online classes. I
specially want to thank S. K. Soni sir who make me understand the concept of
Coal Handling Plant (CHP), the topic of my project report.

Again I want to thank Mr. Kanchan Kumar and organizing team and also NTPC
Farakka for providing me the industrial knowledge which will help me in future.
I will always remember these days.

Md Tadeeb Akhtar

(July 2021 Trainee, Batch 2)

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 CONTENTS
Chapters PARTICULARS Page no.

1 NTPC FARAKKA 3 to 4

Introduction 3
Specifications 4

2 COAL HANDLING PLANT (CHP) 5 to 8

Introduction 5

Coal types, Coal Mines 6

Coal Requirements 7
Merry-Go-Round(MGR) 7

3 STEPS OF COAL HANDLING POINT (CHP) 9 to 20

i Rack Loading 9
ii Rack Unloading 9
iii Feeding process 11
iv Separation of unwanted materials 12
v Crusher 12
vi Stacking and Reclaiming 13
vii Bunkering 14
viii Conveyer Belt System 14
ix Conveyers Protection and interlocking 18
x Stockyard Managment 19
xi Conclusion 19

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Introduction to NTPC:
National Thermal Power Corporation Limited (NTPC) is an Indian government-owned electric
utility company. The main business of NTPC is to generate and sale electricity to power
distribution company. NTPC currently operates 55 power stations out of which 24 are coal
based. It was founded by Government of India in 1975 and now it produces 62,086 MW power
which is 25% of National power generation.

NTPC FARAKKA:
NTPC Farakka is a Super Critical Thermal power plant which is located at Nabarun in
Murshidabad district of West Bengal. It is a coal based thermal power plant and the coal is
majorly transported from ECL Rajmahal. It was first commissioned in 1986 with two units
each of rating 200 MW.

Installed Capacity: 2,100 MW

Coal source: Rajmahal Coal Fields of ECL

Water source: Farakka Feeder Canal

Beneficiary States: West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Sikkim, Assam and Tripura.

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 STAGES OF EXPANSION OF NTPC FARAKKA

STAGE UNIT INSTALLED CAPACITY DATE OF

(MW) COMMISSIONING

First 1 200 Jan, 1986

First 2 200 Dec, 1986

First 3 200 Aug, 1987

Second 4 500 Sept, 1992

Second 5 500 Feb, 1994

Third 6 500 April, 2012

TOTAL SIX 200

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Introduction:
The initial process in the power generation of a coal based thermal power plant is coal handling.
Coal handling plant is a total system which makes sure proper continuous supply of processed
coal to the bunker and also storage of it for odd times so that power plant can run without any
interruption.

Coal handling plant (CHP) includes different operations from bringing the coal from mines and
processing it to make suitable to feed in the furnace. CHP consists of different steps which is
described below:

1. Coal delivery
2. Rack unloading at Track Hopper
3. Putting coal on conveyer belt with the help of Paddle Feeder.
4. Separation of unwanted materials from coal.
5. Crushing of coal by Crusher.
6. Storing of processed coal at outdoor and covered storages.
7. Use of stacker and reclaimer
8. Filling of bunkers with the help of Tripper Trolley

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Coal types:
Based on the heat generated by burning of coal per unit mass, coal can be classified into various
grades. These are listed below.

GRADE CALORIFIC VALUE(Kcal/Kg)

A 6200 onwards

B 5600 to 6200

C 4490 to 5600

D 4200 to 4490

E 3360 to 4200

F 2400 to 3360

G 1300 to 2400

For a thermal power plant, grade of coal used depends upon what types of coal are available at
suitable price and according to that boiler and furnace is designed. Sometimes pulverised coal
of different grades are mixed together to get required calorific value.

In NTPC Farakka Grade F coal is used which generally underlies Bituminous and
Subbituminous category of coal.

Coal Mines:
The major source of coal of NTPC Farakka is Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL) Rajmahal
coalfields (formerly known as ECL Lalmatia) from which coal is delivered through Merry-Go-
Round trains (MGR). Other coal mines are mentioned below.

GOOD QUALITY MINES:

ECL RANIGANJ: Pandabeshwar , Sonpur Bazari, SNQ, Ukhra

ECL NON RANIGAJ: Jamtara

NECL

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IMPORTED: Mainly from Indonesia via Farakka port.

BAD QUALITY MINES:

ECL NON RANIGANJ: Belbad, Jambad, JNCN, Dollar Band

BCCL (BETTER): Damagudia

BCCL (WORST): Katras, Kusunda, Pathardidi

Coal Requirements:
NTPC Farakka requires total of 8 to 10 rakes of coal out of which 4 rakes (2 BOX-N wagon
+ 2 BOBRN Wagon) are delivered by Indian Railways (IN) barge and yard and rest of 4 to 5
rakes are delivered by merry-go-round trains (MGR).

1 RAKE = 54 WAGON BOXES

1 WAGON BOX = 60 METRIC TONNES

THEREFORE

TOTAL REQUIREMENT OF COAL = 10 RAKES = 32400 METRIC TONNES

Merry-Go-Round (MGR):
Merry-Go-Round or MGR system is a closed circuit railway transportation system in which
coal is transported from coal mines to the consumption point.

The two ends of loop are called Loading Bulb and Unloading Bulb. At loading bulb first coal
is loaded on the wagon by SILO and at Unloading bulb delivered coal is unloaded at the track
hoppers. And the loop continues again and again.

In NTPC Farakka the total area occupied by CHP is 4.5 Sq. Km. Below is a schematic diagram
of MGR showing two SILOs at the loading bulb and two track hoppers at the unloading bulb.

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SCHEMATIC DIAGRAM OF MGR

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Coal Handling Plant (CHP) consists of various steps, we will see each step one by one.

i) Rack Loading:
In order to ensure faster and
effective evacuation of coal SILO
is used. SILO is a very big
cylindrical storage in which coal is
fed from the top with the help of
conveyer belts. The process is so
fast that it hardly takes 1 minute to
fill a wagon while the train moves
at the speed of 0.8 to 1 Km/hr
through the silo.

For the MGR of NTPC

Farakka there are two SILOs
are present each of capacity
2400 MT located at the end of
coal mine. These Silos are fed
by twin belt conveyors C5 and
C6 along with R4 belt from
mine ends.

ii) Rack Unloading:

Wagons from the coal yard comes to the plant unloaded by different methods depending
upon the wagon type. Box type wagons unloading is achieved by Wagon Tippler and
unloading of BOBR (Bogie Open Bottom Discharge) is done in Track Hopper.

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TRACK HOPPER: It is a 160m to 200m long platform arrangement from which
simultaneously 12 to 15 BOBR wagons can be unloaded in a single placement. After
placing electrical pulse is given to the device on the hopper which opens bottom gate of
the BOBR and the coal falls down due to the gravity.

Track Hopper Wagon Tippler

WAGON TIPPLER: It is a huge machine which empties wagon one by one by turning
it by 135º and all the coal falls directly on the conveyer through vibrators. For Farakka,
Wagon Tippler moves with the help of slip-ring motor of rating: 55 KW, 415V, 1480
RPM. Apart from this hydraulic drive is also provided for control and weighting of
wagons.

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iii) Feeding Process:
This process includes continuous and control flow of coal to meet the requirement of coal
in bunker. There are various types of feeder used in CHP according to capacity of
conveyor belt. Here some of them are discussed below.

PADDLE FEEDER: It is a conveyor belt feeder used to extract loose materials from
the stack of Track hopper. They are put both sides of track hopper and can move along
the whole Track hopper as they are mounted on rail (length of gauge is 2257mm). It also
turns big coal piece into smaller one.

They moves at a speed from 1 to 3 m/min with continuously to and fro motion and their
rotary blades continuously extract coal and put it on the conveyer belt.

BELT FEEDERS: Crusher is connected with corresponding conveyers through belt

feeders. It is used to avoid impact loading on the conveyers by crushed coal, otherwise it
will damage it.

VIBRO FEEDER AND GRIZZLY FEEDER: The function of both Vibro feeder and
Grizzly feeder is to uniformly feed the crusher by going through some screening
processes using the vibrating mechanism. Their work is almost same the only difference
between them is that Vibro feeder is motor driven while Grizzly feeder is hydraulic
driven. In this plant 4 of each feeder is present. Capacity of Vibro feeder is 1000 TPH
while that of Grizzly feeder is 1250 TPH

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iv) Separation of unwanted materials:
The first screening process involves removal of unwanted materials from the coal
obtained from Paddle feeder. The materials may be any metal or hard substance which
can harm crusher. Different devices to separate ferrous and non-ferrous materials are
discussed below.

METAL DETECTOR (MD): It detects all ferrous and non-ferrous metals which can
cause tripping of belt. It can detect any metal having area more than 100cm2 and a marker
is dropped at the same moment after that conveyer is stopped and it is removed manually.

MAGNETIC SEPERATOR (MS):

It can detect any ferrous metals and
can lift it automatically with the help
of magnetic attraction so no tripping
of conveyor is involved. MS is also
equipped with conveyer for ferrous
impurity which takes it away from
MS and demagnetization causes them
drop away.

INLINE MAGNETIC SEPARATOR (ILMS)

v) Crusher:
The crushing process is done prior to
pulverization. Ring granulator type
crusher is generally used in CHP.
The function of crusher is to crush
the bigger coal particle (200mm)
received from the Track hopper into
smaller size (20mm) and then
discharging them to Belt feeder
either to stack them in stack yard or
Crusher
to supply directly into bunker.

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 vi) Stacking and Reclaiming Process:
The stacker reclaimer is a giant machine consists of a boom and a boom conveyor which
is used to do both for stacking and reclaiming. It is used to stack when supply of coal is

Stacker and Reclaimer

Capacity: 2000 TPH (Stacking) 2000 ; TPH (Reclaiming)

more than requirement of coal in bunker and is used to reclaim the coal from the stack
yard and supplies it to the bunker when coal in the bunker is less than the requirement.

The left-right or slew movement of the boom towards the pile is done by a slew bearing.

The up-down movement of boom is done hydraulically.

BLOCK DIAGRAM OF COAL MOVEMENT

Unloaded coal Crushed Coal of Coal to Bunker

at Track hopper 20mm size from
(Supply>
crusher requirement)
(Supply<
requirement)

Stackyard (storage)

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vii) Bunkering:
In this step, Tripper maintains the level
of coal in the boiler bunkers. It fills the
coal through elevated conveyer belts.

TRIPPERS: Trippers are travelling type

machine which slowly moves over the
rail gauge to feed coals to boiler bunkers
i.e. bunkers of the respective mills.
Tripper

NTPC Farakka has total of 8 Motorized Travelling type Tripper.

Capacity: 2000 MT; Speed: 0.3 m/s

viii) Conveyer Belt System:

Conveyer belt system is one of the most important aspect of CHP. Almost coal
transportation is done by this system. The diagram below is showing overall working of
conveyer belt system and different components associated with it.

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Conveyer belt system parts are discussed below:

CONVEYER BELT: Conveyer belt is made up of plies of fabric duck protected by

rubber and nylon on both sides and edges. Fabric duck is designed to withstand high
tension in the belt. The belt is made to be fire resistant to avoid hazard. In NTPC Farakka
conveyer belt of capacity of 2000 TPH is used where the speed of conveyer before the
crusher and after crusher are 2.8 m/s and 3.16 m/s respectively.

PULLEYS: Pulleys are used at different places. It is a cylindrical component made up

of mild steel and coating of rubber to increase friction between belt and pulley.

Drive pulleys: It is located at the discharge terminus of the conveyor. It is attached with
the driving motor

Take-up Pulley: It moves to keep the belt tight.

Bend Pulley: It is used to change the direction of belt either 180º or 90º.

Tail Pulley: It is located at the tail end of conveyor belt.

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IDLERS: Idlers are basically a roller on which conveyor belt moves. It consists of rolls
made out of seamless steel tubes fully enclosed at each end fitted with stationary shaft,
antifriction bearing and labyrinth sealing.

The idlers can be classified into various types depending upon their requirement such as:

Impact Idlers: It is placed at those location where the coal is

falling from higher point like unloading and transfer points.
It absorbs the shock and prevents belt from getting damaged.

Troughing Idlers: It shapes the belt to support load without

slippage or damage to the belt.

Self-Alignment Troughing Idlers: In one way conveyers it

automatically maintains side alignment troughing. The
troughing action is provided by the centre pivot frame and
offset neutral guide rolls.

Return Idlers: It supports the empty belt during returning

run.

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Self-Alignment Return Idlers: In one way conveyers it
automatically maintains return belt alignment.

SCRAPPERS: Scrappers are placed at the discharge pulley in order to clean the carrying
side of the belt. It avoids the wear of return idlers due to build materials.

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ix) Conveyers protection and Interlocking:
Various switches are used for conveyer protection and interlocking which are discussed
below:

PULL CHORD SWITCH: In order to trip the belt in case of any emergency or due to
any other problem, one can pull the pull chord. It is situated along the belt so one can
immediately trip conveyer belt.

BELT SWAY SWITCH: The belt sway switch gets actuated and trips the belt when the
belt sways towards one side abnormally. It prevents the belt from getting damaged.

Belt Sway Switch Pull Chord Switch

ZERO SPEED SWITCH: This switch monitors speed of the conveyer belt and gets
operated when the speed of conveyer belt is below than 90% of the actual speed of belt
and trips the belt so that problem can be detected and damage of motor could be
prevented. A time lag of 10 s is programmed to ZSS so that it does not trip the belt at the
time of starting.

OVER FLOW SWITCH: It is used in the feeding belt of chutes and tripper. The switch
gets actuated when accumulation of coal exceeds the maximum limit and it trips the
feeding belt to stop further filling of coal into tripper/chutes to prevent choking and
slippage of coal.

EPB: It is an emergency press button to trip belt at any time.

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x) Stockyard Management:
In CHP of Farakka, there are 4 piles in the stackyard each of capacity 1 lakh MT. Pile-2
and Pile-3 is used to store imported coal and there is a large open area between these two
piles where 1 lakh MT of coal can easily be stored. Overall more than enough storage is
available and to handle such a large stackyard proper management is required for
efficient handling and the various steps are:

➢ To avoid auto-oxidation and spontaneous combustion proper coal air interaction

is required.
➢ Lumps and fines to be stacked together and compacted and stacking should be
done layer by layer. And finer particles should be compacted over the bigger
particles.
➢ Stockpile should be made in trapezoidal shape not in conical and the height must
not exceed 10m.
➢ Old coal to be used first and freshly mined coal should not be stacked over old
coal.

xi) Conclusion:
We have seen from this report that Coal Handling Plant (CHP) is one of the most
important part to run a coal based thermal power plant. The journey of coal from mine to
the bunker is not an easy cake. Proper management and maintenance is required to run
CHP. The CHP can be concluded as:

➢ Coal is obtained at the plant mostly by MGR and is unloaded at Track hopper or
by wagon Tippler depending upon type of wagon.
➢ The coal from Track hopper is then loaded to Belt feeder with the help of Paddle
feeder which is then transferred to main conveyer belt.
➢ Before sending it to crusher, the coal is made free from metal with the help of
Metal Detector (MD) and Inline Magnetic Separator (ILMS) to avoid damage to
the crusher.
➢ Coal obtained from crusher is screened and only having size less than 20 mm is
allowed by Trippers to feed the boiler bunker which then pulverizes it in the mill.

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 ➢ Excess coal is stored at Stakeyard and is reclaimed when required. It is done by
Stacker cum Reclaimer machine.
➢ Protection system takes care of any problem related to conveyer belts and also
manages to avoid accident.

Overall CHP Layout of Farakka Super Thermal Power Plant is given below:

CHP Layout-Farakka
26B TP20
TP19
25A/B 26A
TP18 TP21
13A/B TP8
TP7 10B
27A/B
Proposed CH 9A/B 10A
TP6 TP9
8A/B TP24
TP2 3A/B TP3 11A/B
4A/B 12A/B TP25
CH-I TP10
TP23 31
30 28A/B
2A/B TP17 29A/B
24A/B TP22
TP-28 17A/B CH-II
TP-27 C.34A/B TP11
16A/B
18A/B TH-I TH-II
C-33A/B TP1 1A/B 5A/B
18 AB TP13 TP14 TP15 TP16
TP12 TP4
WT 19A/B 20A/B 21A/B 15A/B 14A/B
6A/B
BUNKER-I
22A
22B

C-32A/B
23A
23B

TP-26 7A/B
TP5
BUNKER-II
PROPOSED CRUSHER HOUSE
FOR WAGON TIPPLER
(SHOWN IN BLUE COLOUR)

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