Generalist versus Specialist
I will not enter this debate. I will restrict myself to an incident and leave it to the reader to conclude.
The Government of India had mandated that thermal power stations located away from the pit-heads must use coal that had ash content of less than 34%.
The Tamil Nadu Electricity Board was fully dependent on domestic coal, which was supplied by the Coal India Ltd. The coal was mainly supplied by the Mahanadi Coal Fields (MCL), with a small quantity supplied by the Eastern Coal Fields (ECL).
The logistic chain was a complicated one in the case of MCL- Rail transport from the mines in Talcher to Paradip Port; ship from there to Ennore and Tuticorin Ports and then further transportation by Road/Rail to Mettur. ECL had an even more complicated chain- mines to Haldia Port by Rail, loading onto ships and then transportation to the ports in Tamil Nadu. An added complication was that the ships could not be loaded fully at Haldia on account of shallow depth. The half-full ships would therefore call at Paradip en route to top up.
As far as quality was concerned — the average quality of MCL coal was graded as “F”. In other words, very low-grade coal with very high ash content. Besides, lumps, boulders and extraneous matter in the coal posed a grave danger to the coal handling equipment, leading to frequent outages. The ECL coal was slightly better (E grade), but the problem of other contaminants remained. Moreover, the benefit of the superior grade was not enjoyed by the power stations as the coal from Haldia was mixed with the low-grade coal from Paradip on account of the logistic issues.
Having looked at the supply-side, let us understand the demand-side aspects. All the thermal plants were specifically designed for “F” grade coal. The coal was received at two major Ports- Ennore and Tuticorin. In the case of the power stations at Ennore and Mettur, the coal moved by rail from the Port to the plant. In the case of North Madras and Tuticorin power stations, the coal was moved through conveyor belts. Thus, the material was subjected to multiple handling- loading and unloading at different places and different agencies. Ash handling had become a major problem in all the power stations, with the existing ash dykes filled beyond capacity and the offtake of ash for use in downstream industries like cement and brick making very low.
It was in this background that the mandate of using cleaner coal was received. The Board had to make a decision. I was asked to lead a team to examine the feasibility of setting up a coal beneficiation plant (washery). The team comprised of the Chief Engineer (Mechanical), the Chief Engineer (Operations) and myself, the Director of Projects. I was the only generalist in the group.
Discussions began in right earnest with a detailed technical presentation by the authorities of Coal India at Kolkata. The gist of the presentation was that apart from meeting the statutory requirements, cleaner coal would give us better productivity. I was fascinated by the subject, but a feeling of doubt kept nagging me.
To prepare for this visit, I had read up available literature on the subject. I also had detailed interactions with my brother, a Mechanical Engineer with the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) and on his advice, with the Director of Operations at NTPC. The main take away for me from these meetings was that the boilers in power plants could absorb only that much heat as they were designed for. Feeding them better quality coal would not improve performance. It would only produce waste heat, which would then escape unless tapped and utilized. I was therefore quite keen to know from my team, what productivity gain would be achieved by using washed coal.
The technical members of my team started listing the advantages. Firstly, evenly sized coal would be available, free of muck, stones and extraneous material. These contaminants caused tears in the conveyor belts and damaged the ball mills that were used to size the coal before being fed to the boilers. Evenly sized coal would greatly reduce the outages in the conveyor belts and ball-mills. On further discussion, we concluded that the same result could be achieved by insisting on sized-coal before loading at pit-head. Washing was not necessary.
The second advantage was that we would save in transportation costs as we would be paying for coal and not its contaminants. I lead them into a discussion on this subject and after weighing the pros and cons we concluded that while there would definitely be savings in transportation costs, the margin of saving would not be as high as was being projected. Washed coal would weigh more on account of moisture content. This would erode our savings.
Moreover, there would be serious problems with weighment. As the coal dried up during transportation, it would become lighter, leading to discrepancies in the weight at the loading point and its ultimate destination. Multiple handling by different agencies would further complicate this issue. We could foresee that accounting for the discrepancy in weight at each stage would lead to audit problems that had no easy solutions.
We then proceeded to quantify the benefits of using washed coal. Surprisingly, the gross calorific value of the washed coal turned out to be less than that of the raw coal. Washing would increase the moisture content of the coal and this would reduce the gross calorific value. This further eroded our confidence in the argument of productivity gains.
Next on our agenda was the issue of operation and maintenance of washeries. This was not an area where we had any core competence. Moreover, locating the washery in a different State was a daunting proposition. Problems of men, material, language and a series of other unknowns vastly reduced our appetite for the project.
Further, the aspect of disposal of washery rejects was a major one. Huge quantities of reject material had to be discarded in an environmentally sustainable manner. This meant locating dumping sites and entering into agreements for using them. The operating problems aside, the costs involved were unknown. The political risks were huge. A further corollary of the above problem was the prospect of the pollution cess that many states were contemplating.
As the discussion wore on, I was convinced that we had to take the Board into confidence before proceeding further. I made out a comprehensive report and apprised the Board. Given the huge costs and risks involved, my recommendation was that we should not go in for setting up washeries. Instead, the option of blending of superior grade coal with the sized inferior grade coal to meet the statutory requirement of 34% ash content should be explored. This proposal met the approval of the Board.
Analyzing the entire chain of events, I realized that the mechanical engineering department was approaching the problem from the angle of handling the coal. The operations department was seeing it as a problem of statutory compliance. I was looking at it from the angle of cost, political risk and sustainability. Each of us was reluctant to overstep our jurisdiction and interfere in the realm that we considered was not ours. An overall picture emerged when all of us had broken our silos and looked at the comprehensive picture.
Public policy is often constrained by such silos. The specialist looks at problems from his own angle of technical expertise. He is generally averse to interfering in the realm of expertise of others. In such a situation, a generalist is often able to grasp the big picture (provided of course, she/he has made an effort to understand the technical aspects), synthesize different viewpoints and steer the decision-making process in the direction of a consensus.
In the ultimate analysis, it is not an adversarial Generalist versus Specialist but a consensual Generalist and Specialist combination that makes for good policymaking.
