Govt advises states to look for coal imports
Premium- The directive comes at a time when several states in the country are facing power outages
NEW DELHI : Centre has advised states to import coal along with making efforts to source more domestic coal in order to mitigate the coal shortage scenario amid soaring power demand.
The directive comes at a time when several states in the country are facing power outages.
Speaking at the sidelines of an event here, Alok Kumar, secretary for the union ministry of power said that states have been advised to assess their requirement and look at sourcing coal through domestic logistics and also look for imports.
Amid concerns of coal shortage, Centre has been taking steps to enhance supplies to power plants. On Tuesday, the maximum all-India power demand met touched 201.06 GW, surpassing the last year’s maximum demand met.
Last year’s peak power demand met was 200.53 GW recorded on July 7, 2021.
Coal stocks however, continue to decline in the country power plants. As on April 26, total stock at the 165 operational plants stand at 21.44 million tonne, 32% of the required inventory of 66.32 million tonne. On April 25, the coal stock stood at 21.55 million tonne.
Further, a total of 105 plants have critical level of coal stock, less than 25% of the required stock.
On Monday, union ministers for power and railways held a meeting on Monday with officials from power coal and railway ministries to devise strategies for increasing coal supplies to power generation companies in order to meet the rising power demand amid looming coal shortages.
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During the meeting, unio power ministry R.K. Singh urged all stakeholders at the centre and state level to work hand-in-hand for unhindered power supply. He urged power gencos to own freight rakes under the scheme of ministry of railways to deal with logistic constraints in coal supply.
Earlier, this month, the power ministry recommended that all gencos should endeavor to import coal for blending up to 10% and states were allowed to use tolling facility of up to 25% of linkage coal in a bid to cater to the growing power demand and curb power shortage in the country.