Union Home Minister Amit Shah holds meeting with power, coal ministers

Union Home Minister Amit Shah held a meeting with Power Minister RK Singh and Coal Minister Pralhad Joshi amid reports of the ongoing coal shortage in the country officials saidDuring the hourlong meeting the three ministers were believed to have discussed the availability of coal to power plants and the current power demands Top officials of the power and coal ministries attended the meetingThe meeting came in the wake of several states warning of a possible power crisis due to the shortage of coal supply to power plants officials said According to the data the power consumption of 3900 MU on October 8 was the highest this month so far from October 1 to 9 which also became a cause of concern during the ongoing coal shortageOn October 9 Tata Power arm Tata Power Delhi Distribution Ltd DDL which operates in North and Northwest Delhi had sent phone messages to its consumers saying Due to limited coal availability in generation plants across the north power supply scenario between 26 pm is at critical level Kindly use electricity judiciously Be a responsible citizen Inconvenience caused is regretted Tata PowerDDLThis was the fallout of coal shortage at power plants in a year when the country produced record coal but rains hit movement of the fuel from mines to power generation units impacting electricity production in many states including Gujarat Punjab Rajasthan Delhi and Tamil Nadu Another factor that has contributed to the present crisis is power plants that used imported coal to generate electricity have either curtailed generation or completely stopped as a spurt in international energy prices has made it difficult for them to meet the commitments to states at a particular rateThe Ministry of Power in a statement issued on Saturday had said It was noted that on 7th October 2021 total dispatch of coal by Coal India Limited CIL touched 1501 MT thereby reducing the gap between consumption and actual supplyThe Ministry of Coal and CIL have assured that they are making best efforts to increase dispatch to the power sector to 16 MT per day in the next three days and thereafter try to touch 17 MT per day It is likely to help in gradual build up of coal stocks at power plants in the near future The coal supply as well as the consequent power situation is likely to improveAccording to the data the peak power demand met or the highest electricity supply in day touched 17241 GW on October 8 This is the highest peak power demand met from October 1 to 9The data also showed that peak power demand met slowed to 17003 GW on Saturday October 9 indicating that the power demand is moderating with the onset of autumnThe latest available data of the Central Electricity Authority CEA showed that coal stocks at power plants on October 7 were not adequate as there were 16 plants with a cumulative capacity of 16880 MW which had the dry fuel for zero days Besides as many as 30 plants with 37345 MW capacity had coal for just one day and 18 plants with 23450 MW capacity had coal for two days as of October 7Also Read Coal shortage NTPC has halved power supply to Delhi says Satyendar JainThere were 19 plants with 29160 MW capacity which had coal for three days and nine plants with 7864MW capacity had coal for four days Six plants with 6730 MW capacity had coal stock for five days while 10 plants with 11540 MW capacity had coal for six daysThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever