Coal Policy

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday launched the seventh round of auctions for commercial mining of coal blocks, putting 106 mines under the hammer. Of the total mines offered under the seventh round, 61 blocks are partially explored and 45 mines are fully explored. As many as 95 non-coking coal mines, 10 lignite mines and one coking coal mine are being offered in the latest round of auction. In his address, Singh said coal is considered black gold which plays an important role in strengthening the economy of the country. "Our energy consumption has grown in the last few years and will continue to grow. And to meet this need we will have to start taking efforts from today," he said. The ongoing auctions of coal blocks are a step towards energy security, Singh said. Details of the mines, auction terms, timelines etc. can be accessed on the MSTC auction platform. The auction shall be held online through a transparent two-stage process, on the basis of percentage revenue sha

A spike in coal prices has increased cost of generation

On Novemebr 3, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman launched the biggest ever coal mine auction of 141 mines in India

The coal ministry has auctioned close to 64 coal mines to date under commercial auction

After the removal of cess, the cost of producing methanol is expected to come down by Rs 800-900 per million tonnes

Currency depreciation of over 6% may have supported uptrend; industry players confident that prices have bottomed out

As many as 26 mainly offshore oil and gas blocks and 16 coal bed methane blocks have been notified for international bidding as India aims to quickly increase the area under exploration

Power ministry has asked PSU utilities and private power producers to assess the amount of coal needed to be imported for blending, according to a notice issued

The list includes generation units of state-owned NTPC, and privately owned units of Tata Power, Adani Power, CESC, Hindustan Power

The Power Ministry directed the CEA to compute the quantity of the coal consumed, that was procured under SHAKTI B policy mandating blending of 10 per cent by weight for the power generation

Most state-run utilities are debt-laden and will have to import more coal to fire their power plants due to reduced local supply

The country is facing constraints in the domestic coal availability and the rest of the dry fuel demand needs to be met with imports, according to the coal ministry. The ministry has also emphasised that coal block holders -- both captive and commercial -- have a major role to play in mitigating the coal shortfall situation. Domestic coal production is about 800 million tonnes, according to the coal additional secretary, who is also the chairperson of an inter-ministerial panel on coal linkages for the power sector. The inter-ministerial panel met ?recently to consider the requests for coal linkages to central/state sector power plants and to review the status of existing coal linkages. The additional coal secretary stated that "there are constraints in domestic coal availability and the domestic coal production is roughly about 800 MT". "Therefore, the rest of the coal demand of the country has to be met through imports from other countries", according to the minutes of the meetin

Coal supply reforms are medium term, but they have created an immediate surge in demand. The result is a power crisis

India is likely to face more power cuts this year as utilities' coal inventories are at the lowest pre-summer levels in at least nine years

Authorities on January 1 announced an unexpected suspension of all coal exports due to critically low inventory of the fuel at domestic power plants

The portal was launched by Coal Secretary Anil Kumar Jain

CIL's capex spend during the referred period marks 86.3 per cent of the progressive target achievement

Of these 99 mines on offer, 59 are fully explored mines and 40 are partially explored

He said the last quarter saw "high" output, and issues related to the production of Central Coalfields Ltd and Bharat Coking Coal Ltd are also getting resolved

On an average, captive power plant-based industries are getting less than 50 per cent of the coal against secured linkages and Coal India Ltd (CIL) auctions