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The number of thermal power plants with less than seven days of coal stocks has risen to 56 this week from 52 last week, government data showed on Wednesday.
India's 100 thermal power plants had enough coal overall to last six days on Sept 1, unchanged on week, the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) said. Of the 100 power plants it monitored, CEA said 27 had less than four days’ of stock.
The stock levels are the lowest since mid-2012, when hundreds of millions of people were cut off in one of the world's worst blackouts.
Plants are running short of the fuel due to lower supplies from Coal India. But CIL, which accounts for 80% of India’s coal production, has clarified it isn’t to be blamed for stocks at power plants dropping to critical levels. A high plant loading factor (PLF) and delay related to coal imports were reponsible for the problem, it said.
Meanwhile, moves to open up coal mining to competition have been thrown into chaos by Supreme Court ruling this week that all coal block allocations since 1993 were illegal.
As of last week, 13,122.5 Mw of coal-fired power generation capacity was shut across the country. Of this, the country's western and northern parts had shut down 7,200 Mw and 2,300 Mw respectively due to want of coal.
What is also worrying the Centre is states such as Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, which have been comfortable on the power front through the past few years, are also witnessing power cuts.
