Coal is the prime fuel for a thermal plant. Hence adequate emphasis needs to be given for its proper handling and storage. Also it is equally important to have a sustained flow of this fuel to maintain uninterrupted power generation. Coal is transported to the power station rail or road from the mines. Loading as well as unloading of the wagons is automatic while the wagons are moving at a predetermined speed. Coal is unloaded from wagons into the track hopper. From the track hopper conveyor takes coal to crusher for crushing. Before the crusher there is one set of magnetic separator and magnetic supply to remove magnetic materials. After crusher, coal is taken by a system of conveyors to the bunker floor, also there is a provision for stacking as well as reclaiming the crushed coal by means of a stacker cum reclaimer.

Before coal goes to bunkers one set of magnetic separator and pulley is provided on the conveyor to remove magnetic materials like to be present in the coal being reclaimed from stacked coal yard. Belt weighs are provided in the same conveyor as well as after crusher to know the coal flow to the bunker and also to know the amount of stacked coal.

The coal handling plant generally consists of conveyors, crushers, screens, feeders, stacker cum reclaimer, magnetic separator, magnetic pulleys, wagon tipplers. All the equipments are run in sequential interlocked system from the main control desk at the coal handling plant room.

The R.O.M.(run off mine) coal received will have number of boulders of higher size and will damage the conveyor belts. Hence grid with 300 * 300 mm is provided above the tippler hopper, above which the higher size coal will be broken manually to under size of 300 mm. There are 6 numbers wagon tipplers, 2 no. reclaim hoppers and one number track hopper to receive coal, from which coal feeding starts. There are six number units of 210 MW AT DR.NTTPS. Each unit is having six coal bunkers eachwith holding capacity of 500 MT. Average coal required per day each unit is about 3500MT. Total coal required for all the six units is about 21000MT. Net weight of coal in each wagon will be about 55 MT. approximate weight of coal received for dr.nttps per day.

Coal stock required for about 10 days is also shall have to be maintained, which will used during emergency, when coal wagons are not received on ant day due to any problem on the railway or coal mines.

In the stage – 1&2, placement of wagons on wagon tippler table is being done by inhaul beetle charger arrangement. Outhaul beetle chargers are also provided to push the empty wagons after tippling. In stage – 3 coal plant, placement of wagons is being done by the side arm charger. There are two streams of conveyor belts i.e. A&B streams from the tippler up to bunker floor. The carrying of the conveyor belts is 1200MT/HR. Tippling capacity of each wagon tippler is 12 wagons/hour. 2 no.s stacker / reclaimers are provided in stage -1 & 2 to stock the crushed coal and reclaim. Provision was also made in stage – 1 to coal handling plant for stacking of uncrushed coal, in case of any problem / jamming in the crusher house. Provision was made in stage – 1 to reclaim crushed coal from RH1 to feed coal on the conveyors 4A1/4B1 and can be directly fed to units 1, 2, 3 & 4. This provision is made to feed coal to the bunkers in case of any problem on staker / reclaimers of stage – 1.