New Delhi [India], July 25 (ANI): The government is making sustained efforts to enhance coal production and supply of coal to thermal power plants, Union Minister of Coal, Mines and Parliamentary Affairs Pralhad Joshi said on Monday.

New Delhi [India], June 25 (ANI): Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami on Friday paid a courtesy call to Union Minister for Jal Shakti Gajendra Singh Shekhawat in New Delhi.

New Delhi Apr 24 PTI In a bid to protect the endangered Great Indian Bustard and Lesser Florican the Supreme Court has directed private and state owned power producers of Gujarat and Rajasthan to complete installation of bird divertors in priority areas before July 20The top court directed that the Rajasthan and the Gujarat governments as well as private power producers ensure that a comprehensive exercise is undertaken and completed within a period of three weeks to assess the total length of electricity transmission lines and the estimated number of bird divertors required for the purpose in the priority areasA bench of justices DY Chandrachud AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian said that the court-appointed three members committee will in consultation with the Central Electricity Authority CEA within a month formulate the standards of quality required for the bird divertors so that uniformity can be maintained in the standards to be observedThe bench in its recent order noted that during the course of the hearing it has emerged that none of the parties before the court or the intervenors have any objection to the installation of bird divertorsThough in the interlocutory application IA which has been filed before the court by the State of Rajasthan an attempt has been made to indicate the steps which have been taken the progress has been deficient in all respect it notedThe bench directed The installation of bird divertors at least in the priority areas of the states of Gujarat and Rajasthan must be taken up with the utmost expedition The installation of bird divertors in the priority areas shall be completed before July 20 2022 when these proceedings shall be taken up for further direction This direction shall govern all State owned as well as private power producers it saidThe apex courts order came on a plea filed by retired IAS officer M K Ranjitsinh and others through advocate Sonia DubeThe plea seeks the courts directions for an urgent emergency response plan to protect and ensure the recovery of numbers of the endangered Great Indian Bustard GIB and Lesser Florican LFThe bench said that necessary steps will be taken immediately thereafter for ensuring that the time schedule of completing the installation of bird divertors in the priority areas associated with the Great Indian Bustard and the Lesser Florican is observed by all power producers in Gujarat and RajasthanIt added that in terms of the previous order dated April 19 2021 any company which seeks an exemption from the direction to install underground transmission lines shall be at liberty to move the committee which has been constituted by the court and any grievance may be submitted before the courtThe injunction which has been imposed in the order of this court from the installation of fresh overhead transmission lines save with the approval of the committee shall be scrupulously enforced the bench said after the committee pointed out that it has received reports in regard to the ongoing installation of power lines despite the courts directionsIt said The states of Gujarat and Rajasthan as well as private power producers shall ensure that there is no breach of the directions of this court As already noted earlier the feasibility of and need for installation of fresh overhead transmission lines is being examined by the committee on a case to case basis and hence applicants have sufficient remedies in the first instance to approach the committee and thereafter move this court if there be any subsisting grievance the bench said The top court noted that the status report indicates that the committee received eight applications for exemption from the requirement of setting up underground transmission lines It said The committee has tabulated the status of the applications The committee has obtained a technical report from the Central Electricity Authority on the feasibility of undergrounding 400 kV and 765 kV transmission lines The committee has also sought a technical report from CEA on undergrounding 66 kV and 220 kV transmission lines to which a reply is awaited it saidThe bench noted that the tabulated chart of the status report indicates that out of the eight applications which were submitted to it the committee has approved two applications on the receipt of CEAs technical report permitting the laying of overhead transmission lines subject to the installation of bird divertors and the remaining six applications are at various stages of scrutiny upon which a decision is expected to be taken by the committeeOn March 31 the top court had directed the Rajasthan and the Gujarat governments to file their status reports on converting overhead electric cables into underground power lines wherever feasible within a year to protect the endangered GIB from extinction On April 19 last year the top court in a bid to save the GIB directed the Gujarat and the Rajasthan governments to convert overhead electric cables into underground power cables wherever feasible within a year It had set up a three-member committee to assess the feasibility for the laying of high-voltage underground power cables The committee comprises scientists Rahul Rawat Sutirtha Dutta and Devesh Gadhavi deputy director of Corbett Foundation PTI MNL MNL ANB ANB

New Delhi [India], April 20 (ANI): India has enough coal stocks to meet more than 30 days of demands and there is no need to panic, Government sources told ANI.

New Delhi [India], March 22 (ANI): Union Minister for Power and New and Renewable Energy, R.K Singh on Tuesday said the share of coal-based thermal power generation capacity in the year 2030 would be around 32 per cent in the energy mix as against the present share of 52 per cent.

New Delhi [India], December 6 (ANI): Coal India Limited (CIL) has been directed to achieve 1 billion tonnes (BT) of coal production by 2023-2024 with a required compound average growth rate (CAGR) of 10.95 per cent, said the Ministry of Coal on Monday.

New Delhi Oct 22 PTI Amidst coal shortage at thermal power plants Indian Railways has ramped up the number of coal rakes carrying the dry fuel across the country from 435 rakes per day in the end of September to 487 rakes daily as of Friday October 22 according to data accessed by PTIThe national transporter has also issued instructions to all zones to monitor the loading of coal from mines and increase the number of rakes being used to supply coal to powerhousesAccording to the data out of the 378 rakes which were ferrying coal on October 1 280 were sent to powerhouses however by Friday October 22 out of a total of 487 rakes carrying coal 391 were destined for powerhouses across the countryThe remaining were diverted to other industriesMost of the coal is being transported from Coal India Limited CIL with the number of coal rakes being ramped up from a total of 254 rakes on October 1 out of which 218 were for powerhouses to 331 rakes on October 22 out of which 303 were headed to power plantsOn Thursday the Railways ran a four-km-long train with four engines to supply coal to power plants on a war footingThe urgency to maintain supply via special trains comes in the middle of coal scarcity reported from across the countryIn fact sources indicate that the Railways is mulling putting into service special trains just to ferry coal similar to the service undertaken during the shortage of oxygen at the peak of the coronavirus crisisTill now there has been no problem with availability of rake to transport coal If there is any need in the future coal express trains can also be put into service a railway official saidWe are working together with the companies to ensure supplies to the power sector by ramping up the number of rakes which are put into service and at the same time increasing their availability whenever needed the official saidAccording to the Central Electricity Authority CEA as on Monday Indias 135 coal fuelled power projects totalling 165066 GW had four days of stocksIndias daily electricity consumption has crossed 4 billion units BU resulting in an 18 per cent spike in coal consumption during August-September compared to the corresponding period in 2019 PTI ASG RHL

New Delhi Oct 21 PTI Coal shortage at thermal power plants is lingering on with 59 non-pit head projects having the dry fuel stocks for less than four days as on Wednesday according to official data The number of such projects having less than four days of coal supercritical stock stood at 61 on October 19 the latest data from the Central Electricity Authority CEA showed The count of the plants having supercritical stocks was at 64 on October 13 The latest figures indicate that the coal shortage situation is improving slowly CEA monitors the coal stock situation of 135 thermal power plants with cumulative generation capacity of over 165 GW As per the data the number of power plants with zero days of coal has come down to 15 as on Wednesday with cumulative installed generation capacity of 16280 MW compared to 17 projects with 17050 MW capacity a week back The number of plants with one day of coal stocks came down to 21 with 25810 MW capacity as on October 20 as against 27 projects with 36140 MW capacity as on October 13 Plants with two days of coal decreased to 18 with 23814 MW capacity from 20 22175 MW a week ago According to the data the number of plants with three days of coal stood at 19 with 26770 MW capacity as against 14 20734 MW a week ago Further the count of plants with four days of coal declined to 13 with 16275 MW capacity as on Wednesday from 14 with 17680 MW capacity a week ago As on October 20 the number of plants with five days of coal stood at 8 5932 MW capacity as against 12 12765 MW a week ago Data from the power ministry showed improvement in the power shortage situation as it came down to 4454 MW on October 20 from 5621 MW on October 13 Experts opined that power demand would further moderate with the onset of winter The coal stock situation at power plants would further improve in the coming days with the governments efforts to scale up supplies they added Earlier the power ministry said that capacity of units under outage due to low coal stocks reduced from 11 GW on October 12 to 5 GW on October 14 PTI KKS RAM

New Delhi Oct 18 PTI The coal stock situation at thermal power projects seems to be inching towards normalcy as the number of non-pit head projects having less than four days of coal supercritical stock reduced to 61 on Sunday from 70 a week ago government data showed According to latest coal stock data of the Central Electricity Authority CEA the number of non-pit head projects having less than four days of coal supercritical stock was 61 on October 17 and 70 on October 10 while it was 64 on October 3 The improvement in the coal stock situation assumes significance in view of the ongoing shortage of the dry fuel at thermal power plants in the country The Central Electricity Authority monitors coal stock situation of 135 thermal power plants with cumulative generation capacity of over 165 GW The data also showed that the number of power plants with zero days of coal has come down to 16 with cumulative installed generation capacity of 13495 MW compared to 17 with 16430 MW capacity a week back The number was 17 with 21325 MW capacity on October 3 The number of the plants with one day of coal stock has also reduced to 25 with 34080 MW capacity as on October 17 compared to 26 with 34930 MW capacity on October 10 This number was 20 with 22550 MW capacity on October 3 Similarly the number of plants with two days of coal also decreased to 18 with 25914 MW capacity from 22 27325 MW a week ago This figure was 20 with 29960 MW capacity on October 3 The number of plants with three days of coal also came down to 15 with 20290 MW capacity from 18 24094 MW a week ago The number was 19 with 22000 MW capacity on October 3 The number of plants with four days of coal has increased to 18 with 21915 MW capacity as of Sunday from 13 with 15210 MW capacity a week ago showing improvement in dry fuel stock The number was 15 with 16890 MW capacity in the preceding week The number of plants with five days of coal has decreased to 10 12630 MW capacity from 11 with 10775 MW capacity a week ago This number was six 7174 MW on October 3 The power ministry data also showed improvement in the power shortage situation as it came down to 1456 MW On October 17 from 2714 MW a week back Amid the coal shortage at power plants the peak power shortage had moderated to 986 MW on October 15 in sharp contrast to 11626 MW on October 7 The 11626 MW peak power shortage on October 7 was the highest during the first half of this month Experts are of the view that power demand has moderated with the onset of autumn and heavy rains in many parts of the country this weekend They opined that with the governments efforts to ramp up coal supplies to power plants the dry fuel situation would further improve Earlier last week the power ministry had stated that the capacity of units under outage due to low coal stocks reduced from 11 GW on October 12 to 5 GW on October 14 PTI KKS KKS ABM ABM