Coal India Ltd has recorded the highest offtake of 2 million tonnes (MT) in a single day on March 28, with railways helping movement of highest number of 289.5 rakes from CIL's own sidings.
Clubbed with supplies at private coal washeries and good sheds, railways has helped movement of 344.5 coal rakes on March 28, 2018.
"The synergy between CIL and railway has made it possible to surpass the benchmark of 342 rakes per day set for tiding over the crisis for coal faced by power and other industrial consumers. The day also witnessed another record of dispatching 252 rakes in a single day to power plants as against the daily target of 230 rakes," an official release said.
CIL and railways strengthened their synergic efforts to overcome the crisis faced by thermal power plants from the month of July 2017, since they were called upon to meet the deficit in generation of power by hydro, nuclear and solar power generators, it said.
The thermal power producers were in crisis, as they did not carry adequate stocks at the plants to cope up with the spurt in generation needs. This was due to their reduced intake of contracted quantities of coal during 2016-17 due to subdued generation demand.
The relentless effort has resulted in an impressive growth of 7% in loading for Power Sector by Rail mode during the current year. The daily average despatch to power plants during the last ten days has also crossed the target of 1.4 MT.
As a result, the stocks at the power stations' end which had plunged to the lowest level of about 7 MT during October, 2017, has now improved to 16 MT, despite rapid increase in coal consumption.
With the continuing cooperation from Railways, CIL is expected to achieve record offtake of about 581 MT during the current fiscal, registering a growth of 7 per cent.
Having realised the potential for moving over 340 rakes of coal produced from CIL in a single day, increased thrust is being made to carry forward the momentum to bring the power sector out of criticality and to meet the demands of other sectors of consumers.
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