Coal stock position improves at thermal power plants: CEA

Critical coal stock position at thermal power plants showed improvement last month as compared to November, with 41 projects under the critical category, according to an official data.
"As many as 41 thermal power plants had fuel stocks for about a week of which 19 projects had less than four days of stockpiles as on December 30," as per the latest data of Central Electricity Authority.
This data showed that 50 thermal power stations had fuel stocks for less than seven days of which 30 stations were left with less than four days of stock.
However, the reason for improvement in fuel stock position was not elucidated by CEA.

State-run NTPC's plants at Badarpur, Singruali, Tanda, Korba, Korba-II, Sipat, Vindhyachal and Unchahar showed improvement in their stockpiles on December 30 as against November 30, 2014. These plants had less than four days of coal in November.
However, the fuel stock position at Chandrapur plant in Maharashtra as well as Panipat and Rajiv Gandhi thermal power stations in Haryana worsened in December as they reported super critical or less than four days stock position.

It was mainly due to lower supply from Coal India and its subsidiaries during the period, CEA data said.
Power and Coal Minister Piyush Goyal has time again said that the government's focus is to increase domestic coal production to the maximum extent possible by facilitating environment and forest clearances expeditiously, pursuing with states for assistance in land acquisition and coordinated efforts with Railways for movement of coal.

Coal India has been asked to ensure adequate supply of coal. Accordingly, it has committed to a target of 1 billion tonnes of coal production by 2019, from the current levels of 500 million tonnes.