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The World’s Largest Coal Miner Should “Aggressively” Seek Solar Energy and Continue Closing Smaller Mines
The coal mining company also wants to compete in India’s solar energy auctions and win projects by offering the lowest prices for renewable energy. This marks a significant shift for the company, which produces most of India’s coal.
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Miner Decides to Close Coal Operations and Enter Solar Energy
“Coal, as you know, our mining company is likely to lose business over the next two to three decades. Solar energy will gradually take over (from) coal as a major energy supplier in the coming years,” said CIL President Pramod Agarwal in an interview with Reuters.
The company’s solar energy project with NLC India will be worth ₹125 billion (US$ 1.73 billion; £1.26 billion), with CIL expected to invest about half of that amount by 2024. The group closed 82 mines in the three years up to March 2020 and reduced its workforce by 18,600 employees.
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For the first time in history, 900 quilombola and riverine families in Marajó will have electricity — teams take solar panels by boat to communities without roads.
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In 80 years building 22 thousand dams, Brazil impacted more than 4 million people — and the law approved in 2024 to protect those affected has not yet come into effect.
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China is building 5 cascade dams for $167 billion in Tibet — and the Motuo Project will have 70 GW of capacity, three times more than the world’s current largest power plant.
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993 schools and 217 healthcare facilities in the Amazon still lack electricity — while Brazil entered the world Top 4 in renewable installations in 2024.
Solar Energy Transformation
India currently uses about one billion tons of coal annually, making it the second-largest consumer in the world, behind China.
CIL is by far the largest producer in the country, with the company aiming to produce 710 million tons of coal in 2020-21, according to India’s coal ministry.
The country is a signatory to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and has committed to reducing its emissions by up to 35% by 2030 compared to 2005 levels. Last year, the country’s emissions fell for the first time in decades. Although the lower emissions are partly due to strict Covid-19 lockdown measures, the decreased demand for coal was also a factor.
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