Amid Green Energy Growth, Govt Still Banks On Coal Production

The government will give 11 mines to Coal India Ltd as a review of the coal block allocations threw up the state-run miner as the fastest entity to start production, even as it chases the the billion-tonne annual production target by 2022 amid growth in green energy capacity.

“These mines will help all Coal India subsidiaries to achieve 100 million tonne per year-plus production and add 225 million tonne to the company’s annual production capacity by 2022,” coal and railway minister Piyush Goyal said on Friday.

Eleven of these mines are among the 204 blocks the allotments of which were axed by the Supreme Court. The court verdict came in the wake of the federal auditor saying the exchequer lost Rs 1.8 lakh crore because of awarding mines to commercial entities without bidding, first reported by TOI on March 22, 2012. The other five mines are new blocks carved out after exploration. Read More…

Coal, Green Energy