CIL to supply coal beyond annual contracted quantities to thermal power plants

The development comes at a time when the coal demand is showing signs of slackening.

State-owned Coal India Ltd on August 13 said thermal power plants, including independent power plants, will be supplied coal beyond annual contracted quantity (ACQ).

The development comes after CIL’s board cleared the decks for allowing supplies beyond ACQ.

"With this, CIL has removed the earlier provision which allowed coal supplies to a maximum of 120 percent of ACQ to power plants and IPPs," CIL said in a statement.

Now, the simplification would benefit the power plants which prefer to lift higher quantities of coal beyond their stipulated ACQ.

The development comes at a time when the coal demand is showing signs of slackening.

Coal India accounts for over 80 percent of the domestic coal production.

CIL’s pitheads currently have a coal stock of 72 million tonne (MT), which is 47 per cent more compared to 49 MT as of August 12 last year.

Supplies to coal-fired plants peaked to an unprecedented 619.7 MT in FY24, meeting 101.6 per cent of the demand projected. Compared to 586.6 MT offtake by the power sector in FY23, the increase in volume terms was 31.9 MT, which is a growth 5.4 percent.

Of the 153 domestic coal-based power plants of the country, CIL has long-term linkages with 127 plants of 592 MT. The country has a total of 54 domestic coal-based IPPs and CIL has linkages with 50 of them for 155.7 MT per annum.

During FY24, the generation through domestic coal based power plants was 1177 billion units. Of this, tentatively 78 per cent of the generation was fuelled by the coal from CIL sources at 915 BU.