Power Ministry puts coal miners on week's notice to boost production

On Monday, the Ministry of Power put the captive coal miners on a week's notice to increase production to 85% of the target or face reduction of coal supply from Coal India power plants since the lack of fuel continues to dog their 1,0,327 MW capacity generation.In a meeting by the Ministry of Power, R K Singh said that the initiative would ease a continuous increase in electricity demand. It is a measure to improve captive production, which will free up bridging supplies. The freed fuel can be sent to the power plants that have a shortage of fuel. Secretary of power Alok Kumar told the states or distributors (discoms) with tie-ups with imported coal-fired power plants to meet the requirement from those units in two weeks. If it fails to comply, then it will have to face reduced domestic coal supply to the state's power stations. Coal will not be supplied to power plants having been stocked for more than ten days but less than 40% capacity. Fuel supply will be stopped to plants with stocks for more than 18 days. The coal supply would be halved to power plants with a fuel inventory of 11 to 18 days and an operating capacity of more than 40%. The shortage of fuel has been dogging coal-fired power stations for a month as the demand surged almost 15%. Due to the shortage, the government allowed Tata Power and Adani Group to sell its electricity from its imported coal power plants in Gujarat on energy exchanges for a month to relieve power stations. It will also deviate coal supplies to the power plants with shortages and examine the inventory norms. Image Source Also read: CIL launches Spectral Enhancement (SPE) to ease coal supply process