Coal news and updates

No steam coal imports through Mumbai Port in Jan

A clearer picture is yet to emerge on the details of coal imports through the port of Mumbai in January 2016, as per provisional information available with ICMW.

In January this year, in what was regarded as a major victory against air pollution, the Mumbai Port Trust (MbPT) had said at a court hearing that it does not want to handle coal and will clear within the next three months the mountains of the commodity lying on port land.

It may be recalled that the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board, acting on a PIL, had proposed to ban coal handling after October 31, 2015 on environmental grounds.

Subsequently, MbPT had managed to secure a stay on this order and the case had been slated for a hearing in January.

The PIL had been filed on environmental grounds since MbPT does not have modern coal handling facilities. The coal that lands here is transported to the power plants of MAHAGENCO, Tata Power and Maharashtra State Electricity Board.

Consequently, updated data is awaited in terms of coal imports in January 2016.

However, in December 2015, a volume of 218,003 tons had been imported when the entire volume had arrived from Indonesia in a range of Rs 3,697 – Rs 3,960 per ton ($55-59) per ton.