New Delhi | March 17, 2016: The government has allowed Reliance Power to mine additional coal from the captive mine of its 4,000 MW Sasan ultra-mega power project to save the plant from shutting down that could spark widespread blackouts in the southern states.

The permission came in the nick of time since R-Power subsidiary Sasan Power Ltd, which runs the plant, would have hit the production cap of 16 million tonne for 2015 and 2016 on Wednesday and stop mining.

Under the cap order, mining could have been resumed only from April 1. This gave rise to the prospect of shutting down the plant from the weekend after exhausting the two-day coal stock. A shutdown could have even sparked grid collapse.

The coal ministry had in June last year directed Sasan Power to limit annual coal production at 16 million tonne. The company can now mine an additional 1.2 million tonne in the remaining days of the 2015-16 fiscal. The permission was given after representations from Sasan Power as well as its consumers.

The company said it has been operating its plant at 100% capacity and the permission would allow it to maintain that level.

(Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/)