Power companies shop more coal than Coal India parked

KOLKATA: Power companies have been topping their supplies from Coal India in the four months to end of November with purchases through eauctions, imports and captive mines, data from the Central Electricity Authority shows.

This assumes significance because power companies have complained of less-than-adequate coal availability during these months.

According to CEA data, power plants procured on average 15% more coal in August than allotted to them by Coal India. It was 21% in September, 16% in October and 19% in November.

According to the rules of coal allotment, Coal India is to supply full coal requirement for running 61,500 mw of capacity at 85% capacity utilisation. These plants came up prior to 2009. Another set of plants that came up after 2009 are to receive 90% of their requirement for running the plant at 85% capacity utilisation. These plants together account for about 81,500 mw capacity. Plants aggregating 38,600 mw capacity do not have any allotment from the miner.

"Supplies from Coal India have been on the rise lately. However, they are still not adequate to meet the demand we are facing for our plants," a senior executive of a power company said, requesting anonymity. "We believe demand will fall during winter, helping us to increase inventory to a comfortable position."

In November, Coal India was to supply 43.45 million tonnes of coal as per its allotment schedule. Nevertheless, it ended up supplying about 41 million tonnes to power companies with whom it has supply agreements. In fact, the monopoly met about 83% of the total coal requirement for the month.

Meanwhile, companies with captive blocks managed to extract 2.54 million tonnes of coal while a set of power companies also bought 2.9 million tonnes through eauctions, while an additional 5.16 million tonnes were imported in November.

During the same month, power companies ran their plants at around 59% capacity utilisation, requiring some 49 million tonnes of coal, which was met through a mix of supplies from Coal India, auctions, imports and captive mines. This assumes that a 1,000 mw plant consumes about 4.6 million tonnes of coal per annum if it has to run at 85% capacity.

Coal India Ltd