Coal gasification is being advanced as a strategic industrial pathway for converting domestic coal reserves into fuels, chemicals and feedstock, with industry leaders urging faster deployment and stronger policy support. The Coal Gasifiers Association of India (CGAI) organised an international conference in Bhubaneswar to discuss challenges, opportunities and new technologies, bringing together policymakers, technology experts and executives from the coal, energy and steel sectors. Delegates were reported to have focused on creating domestic manufacturing capabilities and value chains around coal to reduce import dependence.

More than 25 experts presented technical papers at the conference, with particular emphasis on technologies to process India’s high-ash coal and on advances that could substitute imports of chemical feedstock. Senior executives from Coal India, Mahanadi Coalfields and South Eastern Coalfields were present alongside representatives of the Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL), the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) and Jindal Steel. International participants included specialists from Canada and a delegation from Sri Lanka, which organisers said widened the technology and policy discussion.

The deliberations gained added significance against the backdrop of central government support for coal gasification, including financial backing under the Viability Gap Funding scheme, and speakers argued that scaling up the technology could help create new domestic value chains while supporting the Atmanirbhar Bharat agenda. A field visit to Jindal Steel’s Angul complex gave delegates a first-hand view of a coal-gasification-based direct reduced iron (CGP-DRI) plant, which employs synthesis gas from coal gasification in the DRI process. The visit also covered the company’s wider steelmaking facilities and expansion plans where gasification is being integrated.

Conference leadership included Sanjay Singh, advisor to Jindal Steel and president of the CGAI, Dr A.K. Balyan, general secretary, and Kapil Dhagat, vice-president and coal gasification expert, while R.K. Singhal of GAIL and Asit Tripathy, former chief secretary of Odisha, were among other senior attendees. The CGAI said the event sought to strengthen collaboration among industry, technology providers and policymakers to accelerate adoption of coal gasification and to build domestic capabilities in cleaner coal technologies, energy production and industrial feedstock supply chains.