Delhi to face blackout if coal supply not restored in 2 days

A Delhi minister confirmed that there could be a blackout in the national capital in the next two days if coal supplies to power plants do not improve. This comes after a shortage of coal has been reported.

Delhi joins a long queue of states including Tamil Nadu and Odisha that have raised concerns over long power cuts due to the shortage of coal in power plants.

According to a news agency report, over half of India’s 135 coal-fired power plants, which in total supply around 70 per cent of the country’s electricity, have fuel stocks of less than three days, data from the central grid operator showed.

“If coal supply doesn’t improve, there will be a blackout in Delhi in two days,” the national capital’s Power Minister Satyendra Jain said today. “The coal-fired power plants that supply electricity to Delhi have to keep a minimum coal stock of one month, but now it has come down to one day,” Mr Jain said.

“Our request to the centre is that railway wagons should be arranged and coal should be transported to the plants soonest. All the plants are already running in only 55 per cent capacity,” the minister in Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government said.

However, the centre today said it will ensure gas supply to power plants in Delhi amid concerns over coal shortage.

Mr Jain alleged the coal crisis appears to be “man-made, just as the crisis of medical oxygen supply during the COVID-19 second wave.”