General Knowledge
State wise Coal Resource
Gondwana Coal Resource
The coal deposits in India are primarily concentrated in the Gondwana sediments occurring mainly in the eastern and central parts of Peninsular India, although Gondwana coal deposits also are found to occur in the north-eastern part of the country mainly in Assam and Sikkim. In F.Y 2019, Chhattisgarh tops in Coal production followed by Odisha and Jharkhand. Resource wise Jharkhand tops the list followed by odisha and then Chhattisgarh.
As on 01.04.2019, a total inventory of 326.495 billion tones of coal reserves is prepared by the Geological Survey of India, on the basis of resources estimated by CMPDI, MECL, GSI, SCCL and some Private/Public Enterpreneurs, out of which, Prime coking coal is 5.313 billion tones, medium and semi coking coal are 29.690 billion tones, Non-Coking Coal is 289.869 billion tones and Tertiary coal ( High Sulphur ) is 1.623 billion tonnes.
State | Total Coal Resource (in Million tonnes) |
Jharkhand | 84505.96 |
Odisha | 80840.34 |
Chhattisgarh | 59907.76 |
West Bengal | 31690.15 |
Madhya Pradesh | 28793.10 |
Telangana | 21838.94 |
Maharashtra | 12677.16 |
Bihar | 1833.84 |
Andhra Pradesh | 1607.21 |
Uttar Pradesh | 1061.80 |
Sikkim | 101.23 |
Assam | 14.49 |
Total (Gondwana coal) Resource | 324871.98 |
Tertiary Coal Resource
Here we can see that Meghalaya tops the list of Tertiary coal Resource followed by Assam and Nagaland.
State | Total Coal Resource (in Million tonnes) |
Meghalaya | 576.48 |
Assam | 510.52 |
Nagaland | 446.42 |
Arunanchal Pradesh | 90.23 |
Total (Tertiary Coal) Resource | 1623.65 |
Total no. of Coal Mines in India
India has total of 455 Coal Mines. Out of 455 Mines, 219 are Opencast mines, 213 are Underground coal mines and remaining 23 are Mixed type mines.
There were 433 Public Sector mines and 22 mines in Private Sector. Thrust is given on further increasing production from opencast mines where the gestation period is comparatively shorter. In 2018-19, the share of provisional production of raw coal from opencast mines was 686.212 million tonnes (94.2%) against 42.506 million tonnes (5.8%) from underground mines.
State | No. of Coal Mines |
Arunanchal Pradesh | 1 |
Assam | 4 |
Chhattisgarh | 55 |
Jammu & Kashmir | 2 |
Jharkhand | 120 |
Madhya Pradesh | 61 |
Maharashtra | 58 |
Meghalaya | 3 |
Odisha | 26 |
Telangana | 49 |
Uttar Pradesh | 4 |
West Bengal | 72 |
India (Total) | 455 |
Company wise Coal Production
In 2019-20, the production of coal by the CIL (April-Dec.19) was 388.39 Mte.as against the annual target of 660 Mte. The SCCL produced 46.75 Mte of coal during 2019-20 against the annual target of 67 Mte. during this period. The company wise raw coal production target for 2019-20 and achievement is given in the table.
Points to Remember
- Minister of Coal – Pralhad Joshi (as on 2021).
- Production wise – Chhattisgarh.
- Reserve wise – Jharkhand.
- Largest coal reserves in India – Jharia Coalfield.
- First Coal Mine in India – Raniganj Coalfield (West Bengal), 1774.
- India ranks fifth among countries with the world’s largest coal reserves, and is second-placed among the top coal-producing countries after China.
- More than 70% of the country’s electricity generation is coal-based, with 70% of the fuel coming from the states of Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh.