Coal India Ltd. (CIL) to invest in 500 coal-related projects

Coal India Ltd. (CIL) to invest in 500 coal-related projects

Part of: GS-Prelims and GS-III – Infrastructure: Energy

In News:

• Coal India Ltd (CIL) will invest over 1.22 lakh crore rupees on development of nearly 500 projects.
• Projects will be related to coal evacuation, infrastructure, project development, exploration and clean coal technologies in India.

Key takeaways 

• The investment aims at making India self-reliant in terms of coal and at achieving the production target of 1 billion tonnes by 2023-2024.
• The investment will be in two phases for 49 First Mile Connectivity projects.
• First Mile Connectivity is the transportation of coal from pitheads to dispatch points. 
• Computer-aided loading technology of coal is being developed to replace the existing methodology of transportation via road.
• CIL has also identified 15 Greenfield projects which will be operated under the Mine Developer and Operator (MDO) model. 
• It also announced measures for relaxations and exemptions for greater participation of its stakeholders. 
• The experience criteria is reduced from 65% to 50% for mining tenders. 
• Work experience criteria are relaxed by 50%.