Coal India Ltd (CIL), the world’s largest producer of fossil fuels, posted a record production in the June quarter as it sought to meet strong demand from power plants amid unprecedented heat.
The state-run miners produced 159.8 million tonnes (MT) of coal in the three months ended June, about 29% more than the 124 MT produced a year ago. All units of CIL registered higher production in Q1.
“Such growth has never been seen in any Q1 since the inception of CIL. According to a senior CIL official, our production growth of around 36 MT in Q1 has surpassed the overall annual growth of 26.4 MT in FY22.
The jump in production in the June quarter has pushed down the demand growth for the current fiscal to 8.3%. CIL had earlier projected a growth rate of 12.4% to achieve its production target of 700 MT for FY 2013.
In June, when the country faced extreme heat, CIL produced 51.6 MT, up 29% from 40 MT a year ago.
Supply to the power sector reached a new high of 153.2 MT during the first quarter of the fiscal, a growth of 19.8% from 127.9 MT a year ago.
Coal offtake, or the quantity supplied from the coal pithead, totaled 177.6 MT during the quarter, an increase of nearly 11% from 160.3 MT a year ago.
In June, the supply of coal-fired plants increased to 1.713 MT per day against an estimated requirement of 1.6 MT. This resulted in 107% materialization.
CIL’s offtake in the power sector increased by 27% to 51.4 MT during the month from 40.4 MT in June 2021. Higher supplies during the month resulted in an increase in coal stocks at power plants by 77,000 tonnes per day.
CIL’s total offtake in June increased by 15.4 per cent to 59 MT as against 51.2 MT in the previous year.