Jayant, one of the mega coal projects of Northern Coalfields Ltd (NCL) has completed its annual coal production much ahead of schedule. With concentrated efforts, the mining division attained its planned production of 20 mn t on 19 Mar ’21, the company informed in a press release.
The achievement comes on the back of spending performance from the subsidiary company as it surpassed last fiscal’s coal production of 108.5 mn t on 13 Mar ’21.
It is pertinent to note that NCL had clocked 100 mn t coal production for the first time in 2019-19, since then the company has claimed the feat for the third consecutive fiscal while completing the task in a record time.
Overall production still lagging behind:
Demand contraction led by COVID-19 has majorly affected Coal India Ltd (CIL) mining program this year, due to which coal production has fallen short of previous fiscal. As on 18 Mar ’21, total production by CIL reached 559.37 mn t, recording a modest decline of 0.4% y-o-y.
Apart from NCL, CIL’s mining arm operating in Odisha-Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL) has registered a positive growth in coal production for the period under review.
However, remaining subsidiaries are still running short of the previous fiscal’s output volume including SECL which was the largest coal producer last term.
Cumulative coal production by CIL subsidiaries
Note: (i)Production assessed till 18 Mar ’21.
(ii) Mining operations at NEC are temporarily suspended since Jun ’20.
With a late surge in the remaining days, CIL is expected to surpass its previous fiscal’s production of 602.14 mn t. Notably, the company has raised production level to 2.46 mn t/day during the first 18 days of Mar ’21, compared with 2.21 mn t/day recorded in Feb ’21.
Nevertheless, it would be an uphill task for the company to attain its production target of 660 mn t which appears most unlikely to occur.
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