Piyush Goyal fires salvo at Arvind Kejriwal, says no shortage of coal

Availability touched an all-time high of 431.5 rakes a day in the April-May period, he said

Firing a salvo at Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal for his allegation that coal shortage touched “alarming levels” in the Capital, railway minister Piyush Goyal said on Wednesday that there is no shortage of coal for the power sector in India as availability touched an all-time high of 431.5 rakes a day in the April-May period. 

Also, supply by Coal India Ltd (CIL) has gone up by 14 per cent during the same time.

“The coal and railways ministries are working together with all the discoms to ensure adequate coal availability throughout the country and no one needs to worry. Any speculation on that behalf is completely baseless and unfounded,” Goyal said. He was responding to the allegations in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi by Kejriwal, which stated that the national capital was facing an “alarming level” of coal shortage. The letter added that there are not even stocks “sufficient for one full day of generation.” Kejriwal also criticised the railways for not providing enough rakes.  Goyal added that the power plants around Delhi – like Dadri, Badarpur and Jhajjar – were not facing shortage of coal in the past few months. The increase in demand was owing to a drop in production in nuclear and hydro power projects, with hydro segment showing a drop in production of 26 per cent with nuclear power only showing a marginal growth. 

“In addition, around 5,300 MW of power plants in 5-6 coastal states that were dependent on imported coal completely stopped production, leading to an increased demand for domestic coal to the tune of around 22 million tonne (MT),” Goyal said.

Coal loading during April to May increased to 431.5 rakes a day, posting an increase of 18.8 per cent compared to 363 rakes per day last year. “In order to tackle the rising seasonal demand, I have asked NTPC to increase the plant load factor in some of their units to the maximum of 90-95 per cent. We also asked coastal states to buy power from pithead plants so that transportation cost get reduced,” he said.  

The minister also indicated that the supply of coal rakes to Delhi has shown a significant improvement in the last few days. “Demand for coal was very low for Dadri throughout last year (around three rakes per day). But when the power demands went up, they increased their requisition to five rakes and then to seven rakes. Railways and Coal India have been ensuring that they get as much as they require,” he added. Hitting out at Kejriwal, he added that the Delhi government was of the opinion that there is adequate infrastructure in place but supply is a constraint while Goyal has been the power minister.