NEW DELHI: The ongoing coal shortage has begun affecting other segments besides power plants and the railways, with the Federation of Indian Mineral Industriesa(FIMI) stating on Wednesday that aluminium makers are seeing an adverse impact on their refinery and smelting operations.The reason, FIMI Secretary General R K Sharma said, is that these manufacturers are unable to run their captive power plants due to the coal shortage. The low availability of railway rakes is exacerbating the issue, he added.
According to FIMI, coal is usually allotted to primary aluminium smelters by Coal India Ltd (CIL) or its subsidiary through linkages by way of FSAs (fuel supply agreement). “However, both aluminium smelters and refineries being under non-core category, the supply of coal to aluminium sector is severely affected due to priority given to core sectors by CIL,” it claimed on Wednesday.
The industry body also noted that it had earlier requested the coal secretary to include the aluminium sector in the core category to ensure regular coal supplies, but no relief has been given yet.The industry had already faced an acute coal shortage in September 2017 due to restricted supply to non-core sectors.