Coal India output falls for third straight month on tepid demand

CHENNAI: Coal India Ltd reported a 12.8% fall in production in June, reflecting the third straight month of decline in output as national coronavirus lockdowns cut demand for the fuel.
Coal output fell to 39.20 million tonnes in June, compared with 44.95 million tonnes in the same period the previous year, the Coal India said in a filing to stock exchanges. Offtake by customers, such as power generators, fell to 41.61 million tonnes in June.
The world’s largest coal miner, which wants to produce 1 billion tonnes of coal by 2023-24, saw its annual production fall during the year ended March 2020, marking the first such decline in over two decades.
India used nearly a billion tonnes of coal in 2019-20, about three-quarters of it at power plants. State-run Coal India accounts for over 80% of the country’s production.