New Delhi: The government may shortly initiate negotiations with Russia, Australia, Indonesia and South Africa to help state-run Coal India Ltd import coal at a discounted rate as an emergency measure to avoid a fuel shortage for the country’s strained power plants and create buffer stocks, two government officials aware of the plan said.
India opted for the government-to-government import route as domestic supplies will not be able to meet the requirements of daily fuelling of power plants and to build sufficient stocks for the June-to-September monsoon season when mining and coal off-take slows down because of heavy rains or flooding.
The government-to-government negotiations will be spearheaded by the external affairs ministry, and will involve the ministries of finance, coal and power, and state-run Coal India.
The imports by India, which has the world’s fourth-largest coal reserves, come amid blackouts due to a surge in electricity demand that got exacerbated by an intense heatwave. India’s power plants burn around 2 million tonnes (mt) of coal daily to generate electricity.