CIL to float tender for 18 abandoned mines

State-owned Coal India Ltd today said it would float the tender to extract coal from its 18 abandoned coal mines, next month.

"We are restarting the projects...The 18 abandoned coal mines, the tender for the same would be floated next month," CMD Coal India Partha S Bhattacharya told reporters here.

The 18-abandoned underground mines are owned by three of its subsidiaries in partnership with private players.

Underground mining would be revived in six abandoned mines of Eastern Coalfields, eight mines of Bharat Coking Coal, and four mines of Central Coalfields.

"These 18 mines have an approximate coal reserve of 1.647 billion tonnes," Bhattacharya said.

Last fiscal, Coal India received expression of interests from 12 parties for a 50:50 joint venture for re-opening of 18 abandoned mines under eight subsidiaries. Among the parties in the fray were global majors such as ArcelorMittal, Rio Tinto and Titan Mining (Australia).

This apart, Reliance Natural Resources, Sterlite, JSW Steel, Monnet Ispat, Essar Steel, a joint venture of SAIL and Tata group, and Andhra Pradesh-based GVK Power had also submitted EoIs.

Coal India had sought relaxation in the national coal distribution policy to allow the private partner, which was expected to play the lead role in managing the projects and bringing due technology to take away 50 per cent of coal production from such projects for captive use in India.

The company contributes around 85 per cent of coal production in India.