New Delhi The shortage of domestic coal is finally beginning to affect development of new power projects in the country with the government proposing to stop acceptance of companies’ applications for fresh coal linkages for a period of three years. It may also restrict provision of long-term coal linkage to only 60,000 mw of power projects in the 12th Five-Year Plan against the power ministry’s recommendation for 1,50,000 mw of projects.

At a time when controversy surrounding block allocations has caught different coal bearing states in a bind, the Ministry of Coal has urged the Odisha government to submit its action taken report at the earliest in connection with illegal coal mining activities.

In the light of observations made by the parliamentary standing committee on coal & steel, coal secretary S K Srivastava has asked Odisha chief secretary B K Patnaik to expedite the action taken reports so that they can be compiled and sent to the Lok Sabha secretariat.

New Delhi The government is likely to postpone the implementation of coal price pooling because of the strong opposition from consuming states who feel it would raise the cost of power generators and increase tariff for consumers.

Under price pooling mechanism, CIL would have subsidised the price of imported coal (which is 50% costlier now) by raising domestic coal prices and supplying full quantity of coal at uniform price to consumers. The pooling mechanism, being finalised at the instance of the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), is meant to address coal shortage being faced by consumers and would be especially helpful to new power plants to cut the cost of fuel imports.

Central public sector company Neyveli Lignite Corp Ltd (NLC) has signed a memorandum of understanding with state-owned Uttar Pradesh Rajya Vidhyut Utpadan Nigam Ltd (UPRVUNL) to set up a power project in the state at an estimated investment of Rs 14,858 crore.

A joint venture company between NLC and UPRVUNL will set up the 1,980-Megawatt (3x660 Mw) coal-based super critical thermal power station in Ghatampur, Kanpur Nagar, in five years. The capital investment of Rs 14,858 crore would be shared in the ratio of 51:49 by NLC and UPRVUNL.

Bhubaneswar: Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC) today said its joint venture agreement with Delhi-based Sainik Mining and Allied Services Ltd (SMASL) has been cancelled.

The inability of Coal India Ltd (CIL) to cater to power producers has sparked a confrontation between the power and coal ministries, with the power secretary demanding that CIL compensate for the l

New Delhi The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) will further widen the scope of its investigations into the coal block allocation scam by looking into the role of officials of Central and state sector PSUs, including NTPC, SAIL and a host of state mineral development corporations.

These utilities had got allocation of captive coal blocks from the Centre between 1993 and 2009 under the special dispensation route for government companies.

New Delhi In a bid to protect its revenue stream and maintain margins while fulfilling its obligations to supply higher level of coal to the power sector under the new fuel supply agreement, Coal India is going in for an aggressive strategy to step up output. The focus will be on increasing the supply of washed coal to the consumers commanding a premium pricing.

The company, which is producing about 22 million tonne of washed coal at present, expects to take up production to about 300 mt or over 50% of its total coal production by over next few years.

The details of how the reserve price would be calculated and the quantum of the outgo for the world's largest coal miner are yet to be worked out

There may be no going back on bidding for coal blocks by the government, but a new policy would put a price on mining rights for even government-controlled Coal India Ltd (CIL). The coal ministry has decided to charge CIL a “reserve price” for the 116 coal blocks allotted to the state-owned miner. “We are going to ask CIL to pay a reserve price for all the 116 blocks allocated to the company last month. No reserves would be allocated for free now,” a senior coal ministry official told Business Standard.

New Delhi: While agreeing with the constitution bench that auction was not the only constitutionally permissible mode for distribution, Justice J S Khehar in a separate opinion referred to the Mine