The Aluminium Association of India (AAI) has urged Coal India (CIL) to reconsider the decision of stopping coal supply to some non-power sectors by a few CIL subsidiaries.
In a letter to the CIL CMD, the association has said, “This has reference to the upcoming crisis situation for the entire Aluminium Sector due to the ad hoc decision for stopping/drastically curtailing the coal supplies and rakes for non-power sector (NRS) majorly the Captive Power Plants (CPPs) resulting in coal crunch situation for aluminium sector.”
According to AAI, adhoc decision without any advance notice has brought down the industry to a standstill and industry has been left out with no time to devise any mitigation plan to continue sustainable operations. “Also resorting to imports at such a short notice is not feasible and also not in the spirit of the government’s vision to make a Self-Reliant India,” it added.
The association has pointed out that huge investments of Rs 1.2 lakh crore have been made in this sector to double the domestic production capacity to 4.1 mtpa to cater the country’s increasing aluminium demand. The industry employs one million people and developed 4000 SMEs in the downstream sector.
According to AAI, aluminium is a continuous process based highly power intensive industry wherein coal accounts for 40% of Aluminium production cost. Aluminium smelting requires uninterrupted quality power supply for production which can be met only through in-house CPPs.
The Indian aluminium industry has set up 9000 MW CPP capacity to meet power requirement for the Smelter and refinery operations and reduce dependency on grid. Any power outage/ failure (2 hours or more) results in freezing of molten aluminium in the pots which will lead to shutting down of plant for at least 6 months rendering heavy losses and restart expenses, and once restarted will take almost a year to get desired metal purity.
AAI has demanded immediate resumption of coal supply against secured linkages for sustainable industry operations and allocation of coal dispatches through rakes in proportion of 75% (power) and 25% (non-power), as per MoC circular for Auction Linkage.
