India’s coal output will miss the government’s ambitious target of self-sufficiency on the back of delays in opening up of commercial mining to the private sector and slow approvals for new state miners, said a report.
The country is eyeing 1.5 billion tonnes of coal production by 2020, of which 1 billion tonnes would come from Coal India.
According to a report by BMI Research, the country will remain in coal deficit up to 2020, although the deficit will narrow from 191 MT in 2016 to 163 MT by 2020.
However, India will surpass the US as the world’s second largest producer of coal during 2016-20, increasing the market share from 9.8 per cent in 2016 to 12.7 per cent by 2020 as Coal India ramps up output to meet the domestic power demand of the country, the report said.