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The government is examining a proposal to divert high grade domestic coal from thermal power plants to meet the needs of the steel industry for coking coal.
Speaking at the sidelines of the International Conference on NexGen Technologies for Mining and Fuel Industries here, Minister of State for Power, Coal, Mines and Renewable Energy, Piyush Goyal said, “There are certain grades of coal which if washed can be upgraded to coking coal. So, Secretary Coal has been advised to work with the coal companies. We are trying to get an additional 20 million tonnes of coking coal in the country within the next 3-4 years for the domestic steel industry.”
Explaining the rationale for diverting coal from the thermal power plants to the steel sector, Goyal said, “There is a lot of coking grade coal going to power plants, which is not fully suitable. So power cost also becomes expensive and we have to import coking coal. But if we wash this, this can be used as a substitute for coking coal and the power plant will be given some other cheaper coal.”
Goyal also said that the planned 4,000-MW Pudimadaka thermal power plant in Andhra Pradesh will now be running on domestic coal.
He said, “The plant was planned on imported coal will now be given a mine of a coal linkage of appropriate quality.” However, he said that the government will keep looking only for good coking coal assets overseas for Coal India.
Goyal also said that Bharat Gold Mines Ltd has been asked to sell scrap assets to raise money to revive operations.
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