Coal India continues to remain committed to increasing production and supplies to the mandated levels to ensure the country gets power at the right prices, the miner’s chairman Pramod Agrawal said Tuesday, while pointing out that it hasn’t raised the prices in the last four years to ensure supply at a competitive cost compared to the international markets.

Addressing the 48th AGM, the CIL chief noted that coal would continue to be the main component of India’s electricity generation looking at the current consumption pattern even as there was a major thrust on renewable energy.

Till renewable energy production is enough to replace coal, the dry fuel cannot be removed from its top position, he said.

At least in the near future, there is no threat to coal’s standing despite the entry of renewable energy sources.

“Out of the country’s electricity generation of 1,490.277 billion units in FY’22, coal-based generation accounted for 69.9 percent or 1,041.459 billion units. This represents a growth of 9.5 percent over the preceding year,” he was quoted as saying in a report in the media.

The biggest coal producer in the world mined 622.63 million tonnes of coal in FY’22 which is the highest since CIL came into being. This was 26.41 million tonnes more, representing a 4.4 percent year-on-year (y-o-y) growth.