Introduction

Glimpses of Previous Summit

Coal is acknowledged to be the dominant commercial  energy source of the country contributing as much as  50% of the total domestic commercial energy. Almost  74% of domestic coal production is dedicated to Thermal  Power Generation.

In the industrial age that we are living, we all know the  energy is an important input for the overall development  of the country and thereby in raising the general  standard of living of the people. In a democratic country  like ours, this is the one of the primary duties of the  elected government and the Planning Commission has  been actively engaged in fulfilling of this mandate. The  total national energy requirement is foreseen to grow  rapidly in the coming decades with contribution of coal  jumping from the present level of around 530 mt /  annum (2009-10) to above 2 billion tones / yr by 2030-31.  Looking at the past annual growth rate of 3-4% of the  coal industry since nationalization in 1971-73, this means  that the growth rate has to be increased to 7-9% range i.e.  almost doubled. Thus there is an obvious need to  augment the contribution from coal, the only and the  major resource ,to the energy basket of the country . This  indeed is the biggest challenge and hence the theme of  the Conference has been chosen as “Coal for Economic  Growth”. If we look at the short term perspective, the  challenges looks even some formidable with growth rate  to be jacked up from 5.4% in X plan to 7.6% in XI plan  within this plan period.

This additional demand of the coal in the country has to  be met by – the public sector coal organizations the  private sector which has been allocated substantial  number of the new blocks and by imports from abroad  either from foreign mining companies or from coalmines  acquired overseas by Indian coal companies.  Seeing the stupendous growth of the coal demand,  problems of all these three areas would need to be  focused on with a view to speed up new developments.

Target Audience

• Project Developers (Public and Private)
• Coal Producers (Public & Private)
• Coal Consumers
• Government Policymakers center and state (for Land And Environment and Forest &RPolicy)
• Fuel Suppliers
• Bankers and other lenders
• Legal and management consultants
• Other intellectuals

Objectives

The specific areas of concern are:

• Policy initiatives required for rapid increase of Coal production. Delays in statutory/Governmental clearances include Environmental, particularly forest, land etc.
• Issues hampering, new coal block development Coal imports bottlenecks – transports logistics/ ports connectivity etc
• Development of Infrastructure - Greenfield coal projects, for coal movement Railways / Roads etc. Rapid Coal exploration
• Modern coal technology, clean coal technology, CBM, UGC & Coal to oil.
• Issues on safety and time lines for development of necessary skills including Statutouy manpower for coal mines - HR initiatives

The Coal Summit aims to discuss all these issues in depth and present to the new Government decision makers including Minister for Coal; Member (Energy), Planning Commission; Minister for Environment; an Agenda for accelerating the growth of coal sector.