China National Coal Development Company Commences Coal Gasification Pre- Feasibility Work
Oracle Power PLC (AIM:ORCP), the international natural resources and power project developer, is pleased to advise that the Company’s Consortium Partner, China National Coal Development Company (“CNCDC” or “China Coal”), has commenced preliminary feasibility work relating to the potential gasification of coal at the Company’s Thar Block VI Project in Pakistan.
In light of the Government of Pakistan’s recent public declarations of its support for developing the country’s indigenous coal reserves, prioritising and initiating the development of coal to gas and coal to liquid projects, CNCDC has commenced preliminary feasibility work to advance this important aspect of the Company’s holistic development initiative at Thar Block VI. CNCDC is guiding the feasibility study workstreams, which includes market analyses, type of product and scale, process technology evaluation, public engineering of auxiliary facilities required, investment estimation and financial evaluations. In addition, Oracle, in conjunction with CNCDC, is preparing coal-to-gas and coal-to-liquid policy requirements to be proposed to the Government of Pakistan with the intent that the optimal regulatory framework and government policy is established.
Naheed Memon, CEO of Oracle, commented:
“Drawing on the extensive experience of China Coal as a world leader in coal development and integrated industries, we at Oracle are positioning ourselves to become a first mover in the development of coal-to-gas for urea, coal-to-liquids and for other applications in Pakistan. Alongside the development of our proposed mine mouth power plant, coal-to-gas and coal-to-liquids are expected to play an extremely important role in the growth of our company and we expect this work by CNCDC to establish the viability of, and a development model for, coal gasification at Thar Block VI. We are encouraged to see that the Government of Pakistan has endorsed the requirement for conversion of Thar coal to gas in view of the acute natural gas shortage in Pakistan, which can lead to food security problems, in this predominantly agro based economy. Further, the government has also demonstrated an appetite for the possibility of using syngas as a replacement for RNLG or natural gas in an appropriate form. We intend to work very closely with CNCDC, the Government of Pakistan and the Government of Sindh to expedite this dimension of our development.”
*ENDS*
