In an effort to assist the country’s power sector which is running short of coal, Coal India Ltd (CIL) has increased despatches to power utilities across the country by 28 per cent averaging 0.85 million tonne (MTs) per day in the last 10 days, compared to the first 10 days of this month.
“From the period of October 11-20, the coal supply to power sector was increased to 0.85 MT as compared to 0.66 MT during the first ten days,” the company said in a statement on Sunday. Overall offtake too was stepped up during the period to 1.17 MT per day gainst to 0.89 MT during the first ten days, registering a growth of 30.8 per cent. It also showed confidence of increasing the supply further this month and in the coming months to meet the rising demand.
The state-owned coal miner’s production was also ramped up to 1.13 MT per day during the period, as against 0.95 MT during October1-10. “During the first six months of this financial year, we have fallen short of our production target by 19.7 MT, due to heavy rains and the Telangana agitation. However, we are confident to meet the target of 452 MT this fiscal,” said N C Jha, chairman and managing director, CIL. During the period from April-July, the firm supplied 99.98 MT of coal to power utilities posting a 4.7 per cent growth compared to the same period last year. About of four million tonne of e-auction coal for the month of October was diverted following a sharp fall in the offtake to the power sector during the last two months. During the financial year 2010-11, out of Rs 50,233.59 crore from net sales, e-auction revenues was around Rs 8,810 crore.
The reasons for the downfall in production included excessive rainfall in August and September, varying from 1.5 to 3 times compared to same period last year, followed by the festive season, a company statement said. Apart from this, the Telangana agitation which affected the Singareni Coalfields supply in Andhra Pradesh too added to the woes.
