The Ministry of Power (MoP) has revised biomass co-firing policy for enabling purchase of biomass pellets by thermal power plants (TPPs) at benchmark price.
The benchmarked price shall take into account the business viability, impact on electricity tariff and efficient and faster pellet procurement by power utilities. Price benchmarking of pellets will enable the TPPs as well as pellet vendors to establish a sustainable supply mechanism for co-firing of pellets. The benchmarked price, as finalised by the committee under the Central Electricity Authority, will be effective from January 1, 2024. In another modification of the policy, it has been directed that since availability of torrefied biomass pellets is presently limited in the country, the torrefied pellets shall only be procured by utilities for which it is technically unavoidable and utilities which can use non-torrefied pellets should utilise the same only.