Coal news and updates

Co’s coal blocks safe irrespective of SC order: NTPC

September 1: NTPC Chairman and Managing Director Arup Roy Choudhury on August 29 said the captive coal blocks allotted to the company are safe and stand no possibility of getting de-allocated.

“A lot of people had been asking about the recent (August 25) Supreme Court directive on captive coal blocks. We have gone through the order, though not in detail, and find that it is not adverse to NTPC at all,” the CMD said.

He, however, added that “whatever clarification is necessary, it will come from the honourable court on September 1.’

“With this, I want to put to rest concerns of all the people with respect to NTPC that the coal mine operations will proceed without any hindrance and NTPC’s capacity-addition and coal mining targets etc are on schedule,” he added.

Choudhury also said that since the cost of electricity generated by NTPC is regulated by the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC), the company cannot do windfall profiteering, and that is why its coal mines are safe.

The captive coal blocks are also safe because not only can the company not make windfall profit because of CERC regulations, it can neither sell its coal in the market and has to compulsorily use the same in its power plants, the CMD said.