Coal transportation and evacuation cause more damage to the environment as compared to its production, Coal India Chairman and Managing Director Pramod Agarwal has said.
Agarwal, while speaking at the Economic Times Energy leadership Summit, said that as far as the environmental impact of coal usage is concerned, it is the consumption of coal which is majorly responsible for the detrimental effects.
“During the last lockdown, we observed that the production was normal, whereas transportation and evacuation reduced and the pollution load decreased substantially. Because of this when we did the study we realized that it is the coal transportation and evacuation that causes damage and not the coal production,” he said.
Hence, the mechanical transportation of coal was taken up and CIL tried to tender out 35 projects which will cost around Rs 12,000 crore to coal india, Agarwal added. He further said that the company is planning to increase the capacity of the existing mechanized system, which carries only 150 million ton (MT), by 450 MT.
“By the end of 2024, about 600 MT of coal will be evacuated through this system,” he noted. He emphasized that the company is very serious about this issue and they have been studying what is causing maximum damage to the environment.
