Centre says domestic coal production to touch 1.31 billion tonnes by FY25

In April last year, India’s power demand touched a record high of 216 GW, up 6 per cent year-on-year, as several regions in the North faced severe heatwaves.

“The Ministry has been actively engaging with various state governments and Central government agencies both for starting new coal mines and also for increasing coal production in the currently operational mines,” the government said in a press release.

It added, “As a result of such initiatives, production from captive and commercial coal mines has increased to 93.22 MT in April’2022 to Janaury’2023 period of FY 22-23 from 71.31 MT in the same period of FY 21-22, showing a growth of more than 30 per cent.”

In FY23 so far, Coal India’s production alone has increased by over 15 per cent to 550.93 MT against 478.12 MT last year.

The government ramped up domestic production amid a sharp increase in power consumption last year in India, which is the world’s third-largest energy-consuming country.

In January, India’s power consumption grew nearly 13 per cent to 126.16 billion units against 111.80 billion units in the same month last year, the government data showed. In January 2022, power consumption stood at (BU).