India’s coal imports are headed northward, no matter what coal producers say. The recent trend of shortfall in stocks at the power plants is a pointer towards this direction, Mayank Garg, Managing Director, Venerable Energy Solutions, tells Madhumita Mookerji.
What is your outlook on India’s coal imports? Do you think these are slated to go up and why?
I feel imports declined over the last 2 years from the levels seen in 2014-15. And, subsequently after the new government assumed charge in 2014, it also brought in a lot of reforms. Around that time, a lot of coal was available but it was not able to reach the power plants, mainly because of logistics reasons and also because the mines that had been opened up were not able to ramp up production.
But the government came up with some good initiatives and was able to solve a few problems, including those that related to logistics and increasing production. These efforts led to a decline in imports over the last 2 years.
Now, the ramp-up of coal production from Coal India (CIL) is not matching up to the levels that the company would want to attain. Given the fact that power demand is increasing, I feel there is a possibility that the coal imports in the next 2-3 years will come back to the same levels reached in 2014-15. I do see there will be an increase in coal imports as compared to the last 2 years. These may not go higher than the peak levels reached around end-2014. These had crossed 200 mt, the highest-ever.
But, yes, I feel, in the next 2 years, total thermal coal imports will be going towards the 2014-15 peak levels.
What makes you so hopeful that coal imports are headed northward, because there is governmental stress on use of domestic coal by the power plants?
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