India's leading aluminium producer Nalco continues to "struggle" for coal, even as its 1.6 million tonnes (MT) alumina refinery in Damanjodi, Orissa has started running to its optimum capacity, nine days after the firm scaled down production due to fuel shortage.
"Alumina production has normalised at the Damanjodi plant since yesterday, but we continue to struggle for coal," Nalco Chairman and Managing Director C R Pradhan said.
Coal is a major raw material that Nalco uses to generate steam for running its alumina refinery.
Pradhan said the present stock of coal available with the company for its alumina refinery is about 14,000 tonnes, which would last for another five days.
In an ideal condition, the company needs to maintain a coal stock of about 50,000 tonnes to smoothly run the refinery.
Asked if coal shortage could hamper export commitments of Nalco, Pradhan said, "Our next commitment is due after August 15 and we are hopeful of meeting it."
Last week, however, Nalco had apprised the Bombay Stock Exchange that "if coal supply is not normalised, it would affect the refining production and thereby the smelter production and export of alumina".
Despite the coal shortage, industry sources said, Nalco cannot afford to close down its refinery due to its linkages with the international markets.
Owing to short supply of the fuel from Coal India, the PSU was forced to scale down its alumina production by almost half, to about 2,000 tonnes a day, from July 27 onwards.
Till last Friday, the production had risen by about 10 per cent to around 2,200 tonnes, against the normal 4,500 tonnes per day.
