Western Coalfields has offered four million tonne of coal to power plants currently supplied by Coal India’s (CIL) other subsidiaries. Customers can move their existing sale contracts to Western Coalfields.
Several of its customers had shifted to mines that were away as Western Coalfields’ output fell.
With the output rising again, the company has made the offer under its Mine Specific Policy, which charges a small premium while power generators in central, west, or south India can make substantial savings on transport due to proximity to its mines.
As per Western Coalfields, MAHAGENCO, one of its major customers, saved an average Rs 1,200 per tonne on freight in recent years. It has estimated MAHAGENCO’s fuel requirement during 2020-21 at 35 million tonne and has already submitted proposals for supplying the full quantity.
The state-owned generation companies such as MAHAGENCO, MPPGCL, GSECL and KPCL along with other private power producers were largely dependent on Western Coalfields for their coal requirement.
Due to larger distances, these consumers had to pay more on railway freight, making the landed cost of coal higher.
The company commissioned 20 new projects which contributed 35.8 million tonne during 2019-20. To meet additional demand from power consumers, it dedicated 11 mines for them.
The company plans to ramp up production from 57.6 million tonne in 2019-20 to 75 million tonne in 2023-24 and to 100 million tonne by 2027-28 to meet the entire fuel requirements of its power consumers in central, west, and south India from 2020 onwards.