India Faces Rolling Blackouts As Coal Shortage Forces Power Plants To Adopt Emergency Measures
Due to a combination of factors – including environmentalists’ push for “green” energy like wind and solar, plus the COVID-inspired collapse in global supply chains leaving countries around the world desperate for badly needed energy supplies (from LNG to coal to unrefined crude oil) – energy crises have been unfolding in China, the UK, Continental Europe and now India, the world’s largest democracy.
Just like Chinese authorities ordering energy firms to conserve supplies at all costs, numerous power plants across India could be forced to adopt rolling blackouts as coal supplies run low. A minister in Indian capital New Delhi warned Sunday that blackouts could rock the massive city over the next two days. But the nation’s capital city isn’t alone in suffering energy shortages: it joins two Indian states – Tamil Nadu and Odisha – which have issued warnings about the growing possibility of blackouts due to dwindling coal supplies.
According to Delhi’s Power Minister Satyendra Jain, more than half of India’s 135 coal-fired power plants, which supply around 70% of the country’s electricity, have seen their stocks depleted to such low levels that they only have enough to guarantee power for three days before the capital city is hit with blackouts. Typically, they’re supposed to keep a buffer supply of at least one month. But these aren’t normal times.
“If coal supply doesn’t improve, there will be a blackout in Delhi in two days,” the national capital’s Power Minister Satyendra Jain said today. “The coal-fired power plants that supply electricity to Delhi have to keep a minimum coal stock of one month, but now it has come down to one day,” Mr Jain said.
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