Mumbai, Feb 18 (Agency) State-run Coal India on Friday said it has supplied nearly 575 MT of coal so far during the current financial year, surpassing the total supplies of FY2021. In the last fiscal, the total coal dispatch by CIL stood at 574.5 MT, the company said in a regulatory filing. According to the company, out of the total dispatch of 575 MT till February 16, 2022, it has supplied nearly 468.4 MT to power plants, which is 23 per cent higher from 381 MT supplied to the sector in FY2021.
“The 9.4 per cent growth in power generation till December FY22 was the highest in a decade on the back of a strong post Covid economic revival. Whereas coal imports are down to a nine year low due to a sharp increase in international coal prices. This put the onus on CIL to step in with increased supplies to ensure uninterrupted power generation which it did,” the company said. CIL aims to increase the supplies to the regulated power sector to nearly 548 MT by the end of FY2022, it said. “To handle such volatility in demand is difficult for a mining company but CIL managed to do so with increased volume supplies,” it said. It further said that CIL has ensured higher availability of coal from its end at a time when the domestic coal-based generation has spiked up by 17 per cent till January FY2022.
As of February 3, nearly two months before the current fiscal’s closing, CIL dispatched 446.5 MTs of coal to the power sector exceeding the total quantity that it supplied to utilities during entire FY2021, which was 445 MT. “CIL aims to scale up its supplies to the regulated power sector to 548 MTs ending 2021-22 as per the projection of the central electricity authority. This would mean a 103 MT volume jump compared to the power sector’s dispatch of 445 MT in FY2021,” it said. It further said that CIL’s average dispatch to non-power sector is 3.32 lakh tonne per day so far in the current fiscal, which is the normal average. With sufficient coal availability and production looking up, meeting the average dispatch of the non-regulated sector will not be an issue. CIL’s current coal production is at 2.3 MT per day and expected to scale up to 2.6 MT per day and above in the high yielding month of March.