Number of power plants facing coal shortage has come down, says govt

The number of power plants facing coal shortages has reduced in the last four months as state-owned CIL and the railways worked jointly to augment the supplies, Parliament was informed today.

It has come down to six plants with critical stocks and five with supercritical stock as on August 1, from 13 and 17 plants respectively four months ago.

"As per Daily Coal Report (DCR) published by Central Electricity Authority as on April 1, 2018, there were 13 power plants with critical coal stock and 17 power plants with super-critical coal stock, which has reduced to 6 and 7 respectively on July 2, 2018. This has further reduced to 11 (6 power plants with critical coal stock and 5 power plants with super-critical) as on August 1, 2018," Power Minister R K Singh said in a written reply to Rajya Sabha.

The minister replied in affirmative to a question, whether it is a fact that the Central Electricity Authority's report reflects the number of power stations facing critical coal stock coming down from 30 on April 1 to 13 on July 2 as Coal India Ltd (CIL) and the Railways jointly worked to ramp up additional supplies;
In a separate reply to the House, Singh said: "During the 1st quarter of the current (financial) year 2018-19, the growth in thermal generation was 5.69 per cent and the growth in thermal generation from NTPC power plants was 7.76 per cent."
To yet another reply, he said, "Generation from all sources (Hydro, Nuclear, Thermal and Renewable Energy) is utilised to meet the demand of electricity. The gap between demand and supply, if any, is met by increasing the thermal power generation."