India's thermal coal stock at pitheads and power plants has touched 107 million tonnes, which is enough for generating electricity for the country for at least two months.

"This is an all-time high. Power plants, at present, are consuming less due to the lockdown, as markets, malls, establishments and offices are closed. We feel stocks will increase further since all 350-odd collieries of Coal India are fully operational despite the lockdown, which has reduced peak power demand to some extent," an executive at state-run Coal India told ET.

Stocks at power plants have touched 42.5 million tonnes, enough for generating power for 25 days, while at pitheads it is at 64.5 million tonnes, good for almost 38 days.

On March 26, Coal India produced 3 million tonnes of coal, the second highest one-day production this fiscal, despite constraints in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. It has averaged 2.56 million tonnes per day this month with supplies averaging 1.75 million tonnes.

"Initial hiccups in supply of input materials and workers facing police harassment while travelling to pits affected production and supplies during the first day of the lockdown," the executive quoted earlier said.

"Company executives are now in contact with the coal ministry and state administrations to synergise efforts necessary to keep up production and supplies. Authorities of different state administrations have been contacted by subsidiaries to grant relaxation for movement of essential coal mining input materials from the lockdown," he said.

The Centre has clarified that coal mining and related operations are exempted from the lockdown.

"We are mobilising all our resources and will keep on resolving issues and continue to produce, notwithstanding the adversities," another Coal India executive said.

(Writing by Alex Guo  Editing by Harry Huo)
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