Coal India Ltd, the world’s largest miner of the dirty fuel, will generate 1 gigawatt (GW) of renewable electricity this year as part of its plan to produce as much as 10 GW clean power in total, a federal minister said on Thursday. State companies such as Coal India and NTPC Ltd, the country’s biggest thermal power producer, are planning to aggressively spend on solar projects under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s personal push for renewable energy.

Power minister Piyush Goyal on Monday said the country is set to lose Rs 25 lakh crore over the next 25 years as imported coal mandated for power plants could have been easily substituted with domestic coal if we had stayed away from the mindset of India being a land of perennial shortages. Around 83,100 MW of power plants based on imported coal were awarded in India on assumptions that the country will not be able to meet its coal requirement, the minister said at an event organised by Loksatta in Mumbai. This one decision will lead to a loss of Rs 1 lakh crore every year for the next 25 years to the exchequer, he said. “It was the mindset in India that we can never improve and will remain crippled forever,” Goyal said.

Supply of coal by state-owned CIL to power plants dipped by nearly two per cent to 64.7 million tonnes (MT) in April-May period of the ongoing fiscal even as demand by the power sector showed an upturn. According to recent government data, Coal India(CIL) dispatched 65.8 MT fuel to the power sector in the same period of last fiscal. CIL’s supply to the power sector last month declined by 3.52 per cent to 32.8 MT over 34 MT in May, 2016, the data said.

NEW DELHI: State-owned Coal India will continue to offer domestic coal to non-power sectors in lieu of 50 per cent of the import component in the ongoing fiscal.

The development assumes significance as the government is working to eliminate coal imports.

The world's largest coal miner "offer of domestic coal 'as is where is basis' to non-power FSA (fuel supply agreement) consumers in lieu of 50 per cent of the import component will be continued in 2017-18", the official said.

Muted coal demand and eroding profitability have forced Coal India to ‘production closure’ of 37 loss making underground mines in the current fiscal to save between Rs 800 crore to Rs 1000 crore annually. “An action plan was prepared by the subsidiaries in which 37 underground mines were envisaged to be closed for production in 2017-18. This exercise will save between Rs 800 crore to Rs 1000 crore,” a top CIL official told PTI. Coal India has identifed some 60 underground mines belonging to its four subsidiaries, Eastern Coalfields (ECL), Bharat Coking Coal (BCCL), South Eastern Coalfields (SECL) and Central Coalfields (CCL) for closure in phases.

State-run miner Coal India has rechristened its sales and marketing wing as ‘Marketing and Sales’ department in order to give more stress on marketing of the fossil fuel. “The ‘Sales & Marketing’ wing of CIL and subsidiaries is renamed as ‘Marketing & Sales’ department,” an official said.

The board of directors which met this month had advised that the ‘Sales & Marketing’ department of Coal India Ltd (CIL) should be renamed as ‘Marketing & Sales Department’, the official said.

Coal India fell as much as 2.8% to Rs 260, its lowest since March 21, 2014 after the company missed analyst estimates and posted a 38% fall in its consolidated net profit to Rs 2,716 crore for the March-quarter. The company had reported profit of Rs 4,398 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.

Even though the revenue from operations in the quarter increased by 8.6%, to Rs 24,780 cr, the miner was hurt by tepid power demand, falling realisations from e-auctions and rise in prices which resulted in the fall.

State-run Coal India Ltd , saddled with millions of tonnes of unsold coal, is expected to be the biggest beneficiary of a controversial government decision to more than halve the sales tax on the fuel after a jump in local supplies.

The world's third-largest greenhouse gas emitting country said last Friday it would lower the duty on coal from July 1 and impose a new 18 percent tax on solar cells and modules as part of a broader tax overhaul.

Shares of pharmaceutical companies were under pressure with as many as seven stocks from the BSE500 index such as Lupin, Aurobindo Pharma, Divi’s Laboratories, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals, Indoco Remedies, Strides Shasun and Wockhardt hit their respective 52-week lows on the BSE in intra-day trade.

Besides these seven stocks, Coal India, Inox Wind, KPIT Technologies, Majesco, Reliance Communications (RCom), TV Today Network and Videocon Industries, total 14 stocks from the index trading at their 52-week lows on BSE.

Coal stocks at private thermal power plants in Maharashtra have reached precarious levels as Coal India (CIL), through its subsidiaries, is supplying more fuel to the power plants of Maharashtra State Power Generation Company (Mahagenco). According to industry sources, supply to private power producers has been severely curtailed to make sure supply of more coal to Mahagenco power plants to help them ramp up production to supply to Uttar Pradesh.

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