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New UserCoal shortage may worsen if PLF rises 7%
04 Nov 2016
The present stock positions of coal could spiral into a national shortage if power
plants raised their capacity utilisation even by a small 67%, coal secretary Anil Swarup said
here on Thursday. Nevertheless, coal imports by all stateowned power generation companies
would stop from April 1, 2017, he said.
“At present, the coal stock situation looks like there is surplus coal. However, it is not enough
to give coal to everyone and we are not fully comfortable about making coal available to
everyone at this level of stock position,” said Swarup.
However, spot and forward eauctions are an effort to supply as much coal as possible without disrupting supplies. Swarup was speaking
to reporters at a seminar on India’s Coal Sector – Vision 2020 organised by the MCC Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Coal imports by stateowned power companies is slated to decline by 15 mt this year from about 40 million tonnes in 201516, he said.
“We have discussed separately with every public sector power company and have made sure that imports turn zero from April 1, 2017
onwards,” he said.
NTPC is by far the largest public sector coal importer and it has reduced imports drastically from a peak of about 16 million tonnes a few
years ago to a couple million tonnes this year. The company has not placed fresh import orders this year and all its coal imports in 201617
have been delivery of orders placed in previous years.
While coal stocks at power plants receiving coal from Coal India have an average stock of 15 days, there are some 57,000 mw of thermal
units starved for coal since they do not have any supply contract from Coal India.
The National Coal Distribution Policy (NCDP) formulated in October of 2007 stipulated that Coal India cannot supply to power plants
without signing any fuel supply agreement. NCDP was framed at a time when the nation was faced with acute coal production shortage.
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