Ten power plants run by NTPC face a crisis as fuel stocks have been reduced to zero and inventories won’t last another day, as reported by The Economic Times (ET). NTPC (National Thermal Power Corporation), a PSU (Public Sector Unit) that runs 24 thermal power plants, is the largest power company in India.
“Increased demand for power has forced us to generate more, requiring more coal, which has reduced inventory at almost every power station of NTPC,” a senior NTPC executive said. “Although almost all power plants are running at present, we have been forced to scale down capacity utilisation by at least 5 per cent at each of our plants, which is now hovering around 70 per cent. This has led to generation loss due to lack of fuel,” the story noted.
Though the government has moved in to contain the crisis by asking state-run coal producers to supply coal to NTPC and others, many power plants are consuming fuel as and when it arrives, with no additional stocks to meet supply shocks.
Recently NTPC’s share prices also hit a 3-month low as the company missed revenue targets due to coal shortages. Though the country has been facing a coal crisis for the past year, the situation has turned worse. Average coal stock at power plants dropped to six days in October while it was nine days in the previous month.
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