Coal Power Still On The Rise In India

By Paul Homewood

http://www.cea.nic.in/monthlyexesummary.html

While western politicians are declaring climate emergencies, India has continued to expand its coal power.

During the financial year just ended, thermal generation increased by 3.37%, accounting for most of the increase in total generation:

Data for renewable energy always takes an extra month to collate, but for the 11 months to Feb 19, renewable generation was up by 23 TWh from 2017/18, and accounted for 9% of total generation, much lower than in the UK.

By contrast, thermal accounts for 90%.

In short, thermal generation has increased by 35 TWh, compared to 23 TWh from renewables.

This follows a similar pattern to China, where the expansion of renewable capacity is not enough to satisfy the increase in overall demand.

Coal and lignite combined accounted for 1022 TWh last year, a year-on-year rise of 3.6%, and equates to 95% of total thermal output.

http://www.cea.nic.in/reports/monthly/generation/2019/March/actual/actual.html

New thermal capacity added during the year amounted to 5782 MW, down on the year before, but still substantial. This represents 2.5% of current thermal capacity, most of which is coal.