During January 2017 the coal imports of India fell by 22% and reached to 14.31 million tonne in compared to the figure of 18.28 million tonnes in January 2016. Because of fall in demand from the discoms, this is the main reason as they had enough coal in inventory.
On further reducing the dependency on imported coal the government has plans in the coming months. By replacing it with the locally produced coal, the center and state power sector utilities are planning systematic reduction of use of imported coal.
In the fiscal year 2016, the monsoons were good which impacted the demand for thermal power in the country. From power utilities and state discoms, this led to a reduced demand.
To reduce the dependency on thermal energy, the government also has plans to move toward renewable sources. The government is focusing on this eco-friendly movement and this process is going very slowly and gradually in coming months will be cutting down the demand for imported coal further.
When compared with the imports in the month of December 2016, the non-cooking coal imports of January fell down.
