50 lakh tonnes of coal offered by
CIL in October remains unused as Power utilities hesitate to lift Coal from
e-auctions.
The primary reason for the
subdued response by power utilities is logistical difficulty. As a matter of
policy, any coal quantity tied up at e-auction has to be lifted from mine
heads, significantly increasing the buyer's input cost. The cost of
transporting coal through road is on an average at least five times higher than
Indian Railways' Rs 125-per-tonne-kilometer charges.
Besides, the quality of coal sold
in the spot market is also a suspect, according to experts. “While e-auction
coal was offered to us, we did not take part because of concerns on
transportation and quality,” said a senior executive from NTPC Ltd, India's
largest power generator. The state-owned energy services provider requires over
160 million tonnes of coal by the end of this fiscal to run 36,000 Mw of its
installed power capacity.
The Association of Power
Producers said the e-auction offered only an ad-hoc window even as the power
industry was looking for a long-term solution for coal shortage. “Also, the
increased price of this coal owing to transport is not a pass through for
private companies,” pointed out Ashok Khurana, director-general of the industry
body. “Only when these two aspects are clear that the power industry will lift
coal.”
Source: Business Standard
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