Ministry of environment, forest and climate change has given approval to RVUNL to start mining at Parsa coal block at Surguja in Chhattisgarh allotted to Rajasthan Vidyut Utpadan Nigam Ltd (RVUNL).
Energy minister B D Kalla on Friday said that the coal mine spread over 841.53 hectare was allotted to the state in 2015 but the mining activities could not be taken up in the absence of environment clearance.
“We created pressure by submitting the bio-diversity study report and as a result the mine got the clearance,” Kalla said.
The Parsa coal block lies contiguous to Parsa East and Kete Basin (PEKB) from where the state is already getting coal to fire up its plants. But the environment ministry is yet to give clearance to start the phase-II of the PEKB mines.
“We have put pressure on the centre to give cenvironment clearance to the phase-II area of PEKB which is spread over 1,136 hectares. We expect to get the clearance very soon. After that there will be no shortage of coal at the power plants,” added Kalla.
It is estimated that the Parsa coal block can supply 2.7 rake coal daily and the field has the capacity to produce 5 million tonne coal annually.
“The state is estimated to get 1000 rakes annually from the Parsa coal block. The mine has reserves of 150 million tonne coal and can produce till 30 years,” said energy additional chief secretary Subodh Agarwal.
Coal shortage has been a national issue but Rajasthan has suffered more than any other state because it had defaulted on payments to the coal suppliers.
